Achi news desk-
Las Vegas –
Former football star and celebrity criminal defendant OJ Simpson was cremated Wednesday, the attorney handling his estate said after he died last week at his Las Vegas home at age 76.
Attorney Malcolm LaVergne told The Associated Press he was present, along with other unidentified people, at the morning event at Palm Mortuary in downtown Las Vegas.
“I can verify that OJ Simpson was cremated today,” Le Vergne said shortly afterward. “Others were present, but I do not find out who.” He refused to give details about the process.
A phone message for Palm Mortuary was not immediately returned.
LaVergne handles Simpson’s trust and estate in Nevada state court. He said that the Simpsons creams would be given to the Simpson children “to do with as they will, according to their father’s will.”
No public memorial was planned, the attorney said.
Simpson died on April 10 after being diagnosed with prostate cancer last year.
LaVergne said in an interview Tuesday that he visited Simpson just before Easter at the country club house Simpson was renting southwest of the Las Vegas Strip, describing Simpson as “awake, alert and creepy” sitting on a couch, drinking beer and “just Keeping up with the news.”
On April 5, a doctor told Vorgne that Simpson was “passing,” as the lawyer described it, and last week Simpson only had the strength to ask for water and choose to watch a golf tournament on TV instead of a tennis match.
An April 11 post from Simpson’s family on X, formerly Twitter, said Simpson had “surrendered to his battle with cancer.” It asked for “privacy and kindness” on their behalf.
“You have to remember that they shared OJ with the world their whole lives,” LaVergne said Tuesday of Simpson’s surviving grown children from his first marriage — Arnell Simpson, now 55, and Jason Simpson, 53 — and the children Simpson had with them . His ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson before she was killed in 1994: Sydney Simpson, 38, and Justin Simpson, 35. “And they have the added burden of being one of the most famous people on the planet, and who’s polarizing and who’s surrounded by controversy.”
Simpson’s children are the sole beneficiaries of his estate, LaVergne said, adding that he is now working to determine the value of Simpson’s assets. He said Tuesday that Simpson does not have a home in the states where he lives — including Nevada, California and Florida.
Simpson was a record-setting football star during 11 years as an NFL running back who became a movie actor, sportscaster and television personality before he was famously acquitted of criminal charges for allegedly stabbing his ex-wife and girlfriend, Ronald Goldman, to death in 1994 in Los Angeles. The proceedings in California in 1996 became known as the “Trial of the Century”.
Simpson was found liable for the deaths in 1997 by a separate California civil court jury, and ordered to pay the families of Simpson’s slain ex-wife and Goldman $33.5 million in damages. LaVergne acknowledged that Simpson died without paying the majority of the judgment.
In Las Vegas, Simpson went to prison in 2008 for nine years after being found guilty of armed robbery in a 2007 encounter at a casino hotel with two collectibles dealers.
He was released from prison in October 2017 and lives a golf and country club lifestyle in Las Vegas – sometimes offering social media posts about sports and golf. His last message was on February 11, when the NFL Super Bowl was held in Las Vegas. He did not participate in the game.
Attorney David Cook, who represents the Goldman family, said Tuesday that he thinks the civil judgment due today, including unpaid interest, is more than $114 million. He believed to Vergne that the amount was more than $200 million, and that Simpson’s assets would not amount to that.
LaVergne said he intends to invite representatives of the Goldman and Brown families to “look at my homework” with the Simpson estate, “with the caveat that if they believe something else is there … they will have to use their lawyers, their resources, to try and pursue After this pot of gold.”
