O.J. Simpson was believed to be a guilty man for a crime committed back in 1994, but was acquitted of all charges. Karma came back around in 2008 when he was arrested and sentenced to 33 years in prison for a different crime. This fall, he could be released on parole.

“If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit,” was the famous line used by O.J. Simpson’s ‘dream team’ of lawyers after he tried on the pair of gloves found at the crime scene where his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, were murdered. The gloves didn’t fit — likely for more reasons than one, and that just may have been his ticket to freedom.

There are several arguments as to why the gloves didn’t fit:

1. He’s innocent and the gloves just really didn’t fit (not likely).

2. He was wearing latex gloves, which made putting on the leather gloves nearly impossible.

3. He stopped taking his arthritis medicine days before he knew he was going to try them on in court. This caused his hands to swell and made them ‘too big’ for the gloves (most likely).

The gloves not fitting was a huge part in Simpson regaining his freedom, but it wasn’t the only part. There was mishandling of certain crime scene evidence by Los Angeles Police Department, leaving reasonable doubt for the jury.

Detectives brought out a blanket from Nicole’s house when they found her body to cover her up, which could have contaminated the crime scene.

Blood evidence “was sloppily collected and perhaps tampered with, making results unreliable,” according to an Associated Press article about the 1994 case.

A criminalist used a single swab to collect three bloodstains from the pedals in Simpson’s Bronco, when she should have used one for each stain.

A detour was taken when the blood results were being collected. This suggested security was careless and technicians may have altered the evidence.

After 15 long months of trial, Oct. 3, 1995 rolled around and O.J. Simpson was able to step outside as a free man once again. He was acquitted of all charges: two counts of murder for the deaths of Nicole Simpson Brown and Ron Goldman.

According to CNN, this case was described as the most publicized criminal trial in history. Netflix recently aired a series called “The People vs. O.J. Simpson” and it gives a detailed, inside scoop of the trial.

O.J. may have gotten away back in the ‘90s, but he wasn’t so lucky in the 2000s. He was found guilty for multiple felony charges of armed robbery and kidnapping in 2008. He was sentenced to 33 years in prison with eligibility for parole in nine years. That deadline is this October.

It is possible he will go before the Nevada board as early as this summer, which is when he will learn his fate on whether or not he will be released. 

 

Jen Hegge is a journalism major and can be reached at [email protected]