“So we can talk about it.”
I went back to the house, and to be honest with you I was still angry. I kept going on about these criminals she was hanging around with, and these trashy women, and I told her she had to wise up and look for better friends. I think I kind of worked myself into a frenzy—it was all just pouring out of me—and I guess she got scared or something because she went upstairs and locked herself in the bedroom. I followed her up and banged on the door.
“Let me in!” I said.
“No!”
“You called me to come back here, and now you lock me out?!”
“You’re scaring me.”
“Just open the fucking door!”
“Stop banging, O.J. Please! You’ll wake the kids!”
“Why didn’t you think of that before you dragged me back here?! Why did you drag me back here, anyway?! So we could argue about this shit!”
In the middle of this, Kato showed up, so I started venting to him. I didn’t realize that Nicole had called the police, and that I was talking so loudly they were able to pick some of it up on the 911 tape. “This goddamn woman!” I told Kato. “She’s got drug addicts and hookers hanging around my kids, and I’m pissed about it.” I went back and banged on the door again. “Why is this door locked, Nicole?! You asked me to come back here, and I’m here!”
I went back downstairs and kept venting at Kato: “She keeps telling me she wants to make this work, and she keeps telling me she’s getting her shit together, but she’s a long way from getting her shit together!”
Meanwhile, she made two calls to 911, back to back:
NICOLE: Can you send someone to my house?
DISPATCHER: What’s the problem there?
NICOLE: My ex-husband has just broken into my house and he’s ranting and raving outside the front yard.
DISPATCHER: Has he been drinking or anything?
NICOLE: No. But he’s crazy.
DISPATCHER: And you said he hasn’t been drinking?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Did he hit you?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Do you have a restraining order against him?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: What’s your name?
NICOLE: Nicole Simpson.
DISPATCHER: And your address?
NICOLE: 325 Gretna Green Way.
DISPATCHER: Okay, we’ll send the police out.
NICOLE: Thank you.
DISPATCHER: Uh-huh.
I guess at this point she got off the phone for a minute; then she got impatient and called back.
NICOLE: Could you get somebody over here now, to Gretna Green. He’s back. Please?
DISPATCHER: What does he look like?
NICOLE: He’s O.J Simpson. I think you know his record. Could you just send somebody over here?
DISPATCHER: What is he doing there?
NICOLE: He just drove up again. (Crying.) Could you just send somebody over?
DISPATCHER: Wait a minute. What kind of car is he in?
NICOLE: He’s in a white Bronco, but first of all he broke the back door down to get in.
DISPATCHER: Wait a minute. What’s your name?
NICOLE: Nicole Simpson.
DISPATCHER: Okay, is he the sportscaster or whatever?
NICOLE: Yeah. Thank you.
DISPATCHER: Wait a minute, we’re sending police. What is he doing? Is he threatening you?
NICOLE: He’s fucking going nuts. (Crying again.)
DISPATCHER: Has he threatened you in any way or is he just harassing you?
NICOLE: You’re going to hear him in a minute. He’s about to come in again.
DISPATCHER: Okay, just stay on the line …
NICOLE: I don’t want to stay on the line. He’s going to beat the shit out of me.
DISPATCHER: Wait a minute, just stay on the line so we can know what’s going on until the police get there, okay? Okay, Nicole?
NICOLE: Uh-huh.
DISPATCHER: Just a moment. Does he have any weapons?
NICOLE: I don’t know. He went home and he came back. The kids are up there sleeping and I don’t want anything to happen.
DISPATCHER: Okay, just a moment. Is he on drugs or anything? I need to hear what’s going on, all right?
NICOLE: Can you hear him outside?
DISPATCHER: Is he yelling?
NICOLE: Yep.
DISPATCHER: Okay. Has he been drinking?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Okay. All units: additional on domestic violence, 325 South Gretna Green Way. The suspect has returned in a white Bronco.
DISPATCHER: Okay, Nicole?
NICOLE: Uh-huh.
DISPATCHER: Is he outdoors?
NICOLE: He’s in the backyard.
DISPATCHER: He’s in the backyard?
NICOLE: Screaming at my roommate about me and at me.
DISPATCHER: Okay. What is he saying?
NICOLE: Oh, something about some guy I know and hookers and Keith and I started this shit before and …
DISPATCHER: Um-hum.
NICOLE: And it’s all my fault and “Now what am I going to do, get the police in this” and the whole thing. It’s all my fault, I started this before, brother.
DISPATCHER: Okay, has he hit you today or—?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Okay, you don’t need any paramedics or anything.
NICOLE: Uh-huh.
DISPATCHER: Okay, you just want him to leave?
NICOLE: My door. He broke the whole back door in.
DISPATCHER: And then he left and he came back?
NICOLE: Then he came and he practically knocked my upstairs door down but he pounded on it and he screamed and hollered and I tried to get him out of the bedroom because the kids are sleeping in there.
DISPATCHER: Um-hum. Okay.
NICOLE: And then he wanted somebody’s phone number and I gave him my phone book or I put my phone book down to write down the phone number that he wanted and then he took my phone book with all my stuff in it.
DISPATCHER: Okay. So basically you guys have just been arguing?
At this point you can hear me yelling in the background, simultaneously venting to Kato and shouting at her.
DISPATCHER: Is he inside right now?
NICOLE: Yeah.
DISPATCHER: Okay, just a moment.
SIMPSON: Do you understand me? … Keith is a nothing. A skunk, and he still calls me—
DISPATCHER: Is he talking to you?
NICOLE: Yeah.
DISPATCHER: Are you locked in a room or something?
NICOLE: No. He can come right in. I’m not going where the kids are because the kids—
DISPATCHER: Do you think he’s going to hit you?
NICOLE: I don’t know.
DISPATCHER: Stay on the line. Don’t hang up, okay?
NICOLE: Okay.
DISPATCHER: What is he saying?
NICOLE: What?
DISPATCHER: What is he saying?
NICOLE: What else?
NICOLE: O.J. O.J. The kids are sleeping.
I guess I’m still yelling at her, still pissed as hell, and Nicole is sobbing by this time.
DISPATCHER: He’s still yelling at you? Is he upset with something that you did?
NICOLE: A long time ago (sobbing). It always comes back. (More yelling.)
DISPATCHER: Is your roommate talking to him?
NICOLE: No, who can talk? Listen to him.
DISPATCHER: I know. Does he have any weapons with him right now?
NICOLE: No, uh-huh.
DISPATCHER: Okay. Where is he standing?
NICOLE: In the back doorway, in the house.
DISPATCHER: Okay.
SIMPSON: … I don’t give a fuck anymore … That wife of his, she took so much for this shit …
NICOLE: Would you just please, O.J., O.J., O.J., O.J., could you please … Please leave.
SIMPSON: I’m leaving with my two fucking kids* is when I’m
leaving. You ain’t got to worry about me anymore.
NICOLE: Please leave. O.J. Please, the kids, the kids … Please.
DISPATCHER: Is he leaving?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Does he know you’re on the phone with police?
NICOLE: No.
DISPATCHER: Okay. Where are the kids at right now?
NICOLE: Up in my room.
DISPATCHER: Can they hear him yelling?
NICOLE: I don’t know. The room’s the only one that’s quiet.
DISPATCHER: Is there someone up there with the kids?
NICOLE: No.
I’m really losing it about here, yelling to beat the band.
DISPATCHER: What is he saying now? Nicole? You still on the line?
NICOLE: Yeah.
DISPATCHER: You think he’s still going to hit you?
NICOLE: I don’t know. He’s going to leave. He just said that …
SIMPSON: You’re not leaving when I’m gone. Hey! I have to read this shit all week in the National Enquirer. Her words exactly. What, who got that, who?
DISPATCHER: Are you the only one in there with him?
NICOLE: Right now, yeah.
DISPATCHER: And he’s talking to you?
NICOLE: Yeah, and he’s also talking to my—the guy who lives out back is just standing there. He just came home.
DISPATCHER: Is he arguing with him, too?
NICOLE: No. Absolutely not.
DISPATCHER: Oh, okay.
NICOLE: Nobody’s arguing.
DISPATCHER: Yeah. Has this happened before or no?
NICOLE: Many times.
DISPATCHER: Okay. The police should be on the way—it just seems like a long time because it’s kind of busy in that division right now. (To police:) Regarding Gretna Green Way, the suspect is still there and yelling very loudly. (Back to Nicole:) Is he still arguing? Was someone knocking on your door?
NICOLE: It was him.
DISPATCHER: He was knocking on your door?
NICOLE: There’s a locked bedroom and he’s wondering why.
NICOLE: Can I get off the phone?
DISPATCHER: You want—you feel safe hanging up?
NICOLE: Well, you’re right.
DISPATCHER: You want to wait till the police get there?
NICOLE: Yeah.
DISPATCHER: Nicole?
NICOLE: Um-hmm.
DISPATCHER: Is he still arguing with you?
NICOLE: Um-hum.
DISPATCHER: He’s moved a little?
NICOLE: But I’m just ignoring him.
DISPATCHER: Okay. But he doesn’t know you’re—
NICOLE: It works best.
DISPATCHER: Okay. Are the kids still asleep?
NICOLE: Yes. They’re like rocks.
DISPATCHER: What part of the house is he in right now?
NICOLE: Downstairs.
DISPATCHER: Downstairs?
NICOLE: Yes.
DISPATCHER: And you’re upstairs?
NICOLE: No, I’m downstairs in the kitchen.
DISPATCHER: Do you see the police, Nicole?
NICOLE: No, but I will go out there right now.
DISPATCHER: Okay, you want to go out there?
NICOLE: Yeah.
DISPATCHER: Okay.
NICOLE: I’m going to hang up.
DISPATCHER: Okay.
Then the cops showed up, two of them, followed by a supervisor, and it took both Nicole and I a little while to calm down. I told the officers that Nicole was exposing my kids to all sorts of unsavory people, which I wasn’t happy about, and she told them that all I did was complain about her friends. I don’t think they were all that interested in the details, because one cop just cut to the chase: “Has he ever hit you?” he asked her.
“Yeah,” she said. “Once. We had this one incident in 1989.”
Once. I hit her once—not even hit her, technically—and ever since that day I’d been known as a wife-beater. Whatever they were thinking, I wasn’t there in the capacity of a so-called wife beater—I was there because I was concerned about my kids.
Let me share with you an excerpt from the civil trial. The man on the stand is Robert Lerner of the L.A.P.D., one of the officers who responded that day, October 25, 1993. The man asking the questions is attorney Robert Baker:
BAKER: Now, in terms of your conversations with O.J. Simpson, Mr. Simpson was upset about the people—and he informed you of this—that his wife was running around with, correct?
LERNER: Correct.
BAKER: And he was upset about the fact that she was, in fact, in his view and from his information, running—having people in the house who were hookers, correct?
LERNER: He was concerned.
BAKER: And he was concerned that there was one person that he thought was bad for his kids and that his wife shouldn’t associate with, and he didn’t want him around the house; isn’t that true?
LERNER. Yes.
BAKER: And that was a gentleman with the first name of Keith, correct?
LERNER: Yes.
BAKER: And he expressed that to you, that in fact these people that were around the house had some sort of dealings with Heidi Fleiss, correct?
LERNER: That’s what he indicated.
BAKER: And he was upset about that, those people being around his house where his kids were; he informed you of that, didn’t he?
LERNER: Yes.
BAKER: And he also indicated to you, sir, that he never had intended, nor was he ever considering any physical violence to Nicole Brown Simpson that evening, correct?
LERNER. Correct.
BAKER: And he also indicated to you that the door that she said was broken, before that, she told you he broke—it was broken before he ever went to the house. Isn’t that correct?
LERNER: That’s what he claimed.
This was in October 1993, almost eight months before Nicole was murdered. Still, when the trial finally got underway, everyone acted like my lawyers were making this stuff up. They weren’t. Nicole had been associating with hookers and drug dealers and unsavory characters from way back, and I’d been begging her to keep those people away from my children. And I went on record with my concerns that night when I spoke to the police about it.
Now here’s the weird part: The next day, the very morning after the fight, I was back on the set, working, when Nicole called. “Hey, how you doing?” she said, as if nothing had happened.
“Fine.”
“Did you play golf this morning?”
“No. I’m working. We’re shooting.”
“So everything’s good?” she asked.
She was feeling me out, seeing if I was still angry, and I told her yes, I was very fucking angry. She dragged me back to the house and then called the police on me, and all because I was concerned about my kids, and about the direction her life was taking.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Great!”
“What are you doing later?”
“Going back to New York. What the hell do you think I’m doing?”
For the next several weeks, I stayed on that crazy back-and-forth schedule. I’d be in New York for the sports show, then fly back late Sunday to work on Naked Gun for a couple of days. Then it was back to New York, with a stop or two on the way to interview one athlete or another for the show. Sunday night, the cycle started all over again—like my own personal version of that movie, Groundhog Day.
Whenever I was in L.A., visiting with the kids, Nicole was generally on her best behavior, but during this period she began to seem unusually tired. I think the stress of keeping it together around me was almost more than she could take. She really wanted this thing to work, so she was determined to be a good little girl, but the effort left her exhausted. I also began to wonder whether she was doing drugs.
The one thing that she wasn’t able to control was this constant harping about our living arrangement. She kept pushing me to let her and the kids move back into Rockingham, and I ke
pt telling her no. I suggested that she rent another place, or, better yet, buy one, and she finally took my advice and found a nice condo on Bundy, near Dorothy Street. There was one major problem, though. She couldn’t afford to buy it unless she sold her condo in San Francisco, and because the timing was wrong she was worried about the tax bite. When she looked into it, she discovered that she could avoid that problem by claiming that the place on Bundy was a rental property, and to indicate in her tax return that she and the kids were actually living with me. I didn’t want any part of that scheme, and I told her so. “The last thing I need is a problem with the IRS,” I said.
“But I don’t understand,” she said. “I’m going to be moving back in with you anyway.”
“I can’t do it,” I said.
She was pretty angry, and for a while the good Nicole was nowhere in evidence. Luckily I wasn’t around too often, but even when I wasn’t home she somehow managed to bring her problems to my doorstep—literally. She would come by the house with the kids, say, to use the pool, and she took to ordering Michele around, acting like she still lived there. Michele tolerated it, but there were limits. One day Nicole asked to be let into my home office, which was locked, and Michele told her she’d have to get permission from me. “No one is allowed in Mr. Simpson’s office,” she reminded her. “It’s one of his rules.”
“I’m not asking you,” Nicole said. “I’m telling you.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Nicole. I can’t let you in without Mr. Simpson’s say so.”
Nicole went off on her, cursing and calling her names, then went out to the pool and grabbed the kids and took off in a huff. She was making friends left and right.
I came home for Christmas, and we focused on the kids, spoiling them with presents. I got a few small presents of my own, but only one of them really meant anything to me, and that was the fact that we didn’t have a single scene or a single argument in the course of that entire week. I don’t know if that qualifies as a present, but I appreciated it, and I made a point of telling her so. To be honest with you, when things were good like that, I always found myself feeling badly—always found myself thinking about the way things might have been. Nicole had given me fifteen great years, but that Nicole hadn’t been around much recently, and the Nicole who had taken her place was not someone I knew or even wanted to know. At that point, I was pretty much biding my time until the year was up. And in some ways, to be honest, I was already gone.
I remember speaking to Nicole’s mother about the various problems—the business with the housekeeper, the questionable friends, the drugs—and she was just as concerned as I was. Unlike me, though, she was still hopeful. “Maybe it’s just a phase,” she said. “Maybe she’ll get tired of running around with those people.”
If I Did It Page 13