Authors: O.J. Simpson
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: What kind of car was she driving?
O.J.: Her black car, a Cherokee, a Jeep Cherokee.
VANNATTER: What were you driving?
O.J.: My RollsRoyce, my Bentley.
VANNATTER: Do you own that Ford Bronco that sits outside?
O.J.: Hertz owns it, and Hertz lets me use it.
VANNATTER: So that's your vehicle, the one that was parked there
on the street?
O.J.: Mmm hmm.
VANNATTER: And it's actually owned by Hertz?
O.J.: Hertz, yeah.
VANNATTER: Who's the primary driver on that? You?
O.J.: I drive it, the housekeeper drives it, you know, it's kind
of a-
VANNATTER: Allpurpose type vehicle?
O.J.: Allpurpose, yeah. It's the only one that my insurance will
allow me to let anyone else drive.
VANNATTER: Okay.
LANGE: When you drive it, where do you park it at home? Where
it is now, it was in the street or something?
O.J.: I always park it on the street.
LANGE: You never take it in the-
O.J.: Oh, rarely. I mean, I'll bring it in and switch the stuff, you
know, and stuff like that. I did that yesterday, you know.
LANGE: When did you last drive it?
O.J.: Yesterday.
VANNATTER: What time yesterday?
O.J.: In the morning, in the afternoon.
VANNATTER: Okay, you left her, you're saying, about sixthirty or
seven, or she left the recital?
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: And you spoke with her parents?
Yeah, we were just sitting there talking.
VANNATTER: Okay, what time did you leave the recital?
O.J.: Right about that time. We were all leaving. We were all
leaving then. Her mother said something about me joining
them for dinner, and I said no thanks.
VANNATTER: Where did you go from there, O.J.?
O.J.: Ah, home, home for a while, got my car for a while, tried to
find my girlfriend for a while, came back to the house.
VANNATTER: Who was home when you got home?
O.J.: Kato.
VANNATTER: Kato? Anybody else? Was your daughter there,
Arnelle?
O.J.: No.
VANNATTER: Isn't that her name, Arnelle?
O.J.: Arnelle, yeah.
VANNATTER: So what time do you think you got back home,
actually physically got home?
O.J.: Sevensomething.
VANNATTER: Sevensomething? And then you left, and-
O.J.: Yeah, I'm trying to think, did I leave? You know, I'm
always . I had to run and get my daughter some flowers.
I was actually doing the recital, so I rushed and got her some
flowers, and I came home, and then I called Paula as I was
going to her house, and Paula wasn't home.
VANNATTER: Paula is your girlfriend?
O.J.: Girlfriend, yeah.
VANNATTER: Paula who?
O.J.: Barbieri.
VANNATTER: Could you spell that for me?
O.J.: BARBIERI.
VANNATTER: Do you know an address on her?
O.J.: No, she lives on Wilshire, but I think she's out of town.
VANNATTER: You got a phone number?
O.J.: Yeah . . .
VANNATTER: So you didn't see her last night?
O.J.: No, we'd been to a big affair the night before, and then I
came back home. I was basically at home. I mean, any time I
was—whatever time it took me to get to the recital and back,
to get to the flower shop and back, I mean, that's the time I
was out of the house.
VANNATTER: Were you scheduled to play golf this morning,
some place?
O.J.: In Chicago.
VANNATTER: What kind of tournament was it?
Ah, it was Hertz, with special clients.
VANNATTER: Oh, okay. What time did you leave last night, leave
the house?
O.J.: To go to the airport?
VANNATTER: Mmm hmm.
O.J.: About. . . . The limo was supposed to be there at ten forty-
five. Normally, they get there a little earlier. I was rushing
around—somewhere between there and eleven.
VANNATTER: So approximately ten fortyfive to eleven.
O.J.: Eleven o'clock, yeah, somewhere in that area.
VANNATTER: And you went by limo?
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: Who's the limo service?
O.J.: Ah, you have to ask my office.
LANGE: Did you converse with the driver at all? Did you talk to him?
.: No, he was a new driver. Normally, I have a regular driver I
drive with and converse. No, just about rushing to the
airport, about how I live my life on airplanes, and hotels, that
type of thing.
LANGE: What time did the plane leave?
Ah, eleven fortyfive the flight took off.
VANNATTER: What airline was it?
O.J.: American.
VANNATTER: American? And it was eleven fortyfive to Chicago?
O.J.: Chicago.
LANGE: So yesterday you did drive the white Bronco?
O.J.: Mmm hmm.
LANGE: And where did you park it when you brought it home?
O.J.: Ah, the first time probably by the mailbox. I'm trying to
think, or did I bring it in the driveway? Normally, I will park
it by the mailbox, sometimes ...
LANGE: On Ashford, or Ashland?
O.J.: On Ashford, yeah.
LANGE: Where did you park yesterday for the last time, do you
remember?
O.J.: Right where it is.
LANGE: Where it is now?
O.J.: Yeah.
LANGE: Where, on—?
O.J.: Right on the street there.
LANGE: On Ashford?
O.J.: No, on Rockingham.
LANGE: You parked it there?
O.J.: Yes.
LANGE: About what time was that?
O.J.: Eightsomething, seven . . . eight, nine o'clock, I don't know,
right in that area.
LANGE: Did you take it to the recital?
O.J.: No.
LANGE: What time was the recital?
O.J.: Over at about sixthirty. Like I said, I came home, I got my
car, I was going to see my girlfriend. I was calling her and she
wasn't around.
LANGE: So you drove the—you came home in the Rolls, and then
you got in the Bronco .. .
O.J.: In the Bronco, 'cause my phone was in the Bronco. And
because it's a Bronco. It's a Bronco, it's what I drive, you
know. I'd rather drive it than any other car. And, you know,
as I was going over there, I called her a couple of times and
she wasn't there, and I left a message, and then I checked my
messages, and there were no new messages. She wasn't there,
and she may have to leave town. Then I came back and
ended up sitting with Kato.
LANGE: Okay, what time was this again that you parked the
Bronco?
O.J.: Eightsomething, maybe. He hadn't done a Jacuzzi, we had .
Went and got a burger, and I'd come home and kind of
leisurely got ready to go. I mean, we'd done a few things . . .
LANGE: You weren't in a hurry when you came back with the
Bronco.
O.J.: No.
LANGE: The reason I asked you, the cars were parked kind of at a
funny angle, stuck out in the street.
O.J.: Well, it's parked because. . . . I don't know if it's a funny angle
or what. It's parked because when I was hustling at the end of
the day to get all my stuff, and I was getting my phone and
everything off it, when I just pulled it out of the gate there,
it's like it's a tight turn.
LANGE: So you had it inside the compound, then?
O.J.: Yeah.
LANGE: Oh, okay.
O.J.: I brought it inside the compound to get my stuff out of it,
and then I put it out, and I'd run back inside the gate before
the gate closes.
VANNATTER: O.J., what's your office phone number?
0.J.: (gives number)
VANNATTER: And is that area code 310?
0.J.: Yes.
VANNATTER: How did you get the injury on your hand?
0.J.: I don't know. The first time, when I was in Chicago and all,
but at the house I was just running around.
VANNATTER:How did you do it in Chicago?
O.J.: I broke a glass. One of you guys had just called me, and I
was in the bathroom, and I just kind of went bonkers for a
little bit.
LANGE: Is that how you cut it?
O.J.: Mmm, it was cut before, but I think I just opened it again,
I'm not sure.
LANGE: Do you recall bleeding at all in your truck, in the Bronco?
O.J.: I recall bleeding at my house and then I went to the Bronco.
The last thing I did before I left, when I was rushing, was
went and got my phone out of the Bronco.
LANGE: Mmm hmm. Where's the phone now?
0.J.: In my bag.
LANGE: You have it?
0.J.: In that black bag.
LANGE: You brought a bag with you here?
O.J.: Yeah, it's-
LANGE: So do you recall bleeding at all?
0.J.: Yeah, I mean, I knew I was bleeding, but it was no big deal. I
bleed all the time. I play golf and stuff, so there's always
something, nicks and stuff here and there.
LANGE: So did you do anything? When did you put the BandAid
on it?
0.J.: Actually, I asked the girl this morning for it.
LANGE: And she got it?
0.J.: Yeah, 'cause last night with Kato, when I was leaving, he was
saying something to me, and I was rushing to get my phone,
and I put a little thing on it, and it stopped.
VANNATTER: Do you have the keys to that Bronco?
0.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: Okay. We've impounded the Bronco. I don't know if
you know that or not.
0.J.: No.
VANNATTER: —take a look at it. Other than you, who's the last
person to drive it?
0.J.: Probably Gigi. When I'm out of town, I don't know who
drives the car, maybe my daughter, maybe Kato.
VANNATTER: The keys are available?
0.J.: I leave the keys there, you know, when Gigi's there because
sometimes she needs it, or Gigi was off and wasn't coming
back until today, and I was coming back tonight.
VANNATTER: So you don't mind if Gigi uses it, or-
0.J.: This is the only one I can let her use. When she doesn't have
her car, 'cause sometimes her husband takes her car, I let her
use the car.
LANGE: When was the last time you were at Nicole's house?
O.J.: I don't go in, I won't go in her house. I haven't been in her
house in a week, maybe five days. I go to her house a lot. I
mean, I'm always dropping the kids off, picking the kids up,
fooling around with the dog, you know.
VANNATTER: How does that usually work? Do you drop them at
the porch, or do you go in with them?
O.J.: No, I don't go in the house.
VANNATTER: Is there a kind of gate out front?
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: But you never go inside the house?
O.J.: Up until about five days, six days ago, I haven't been in the
house. Once I started seeing Paula again, I kind of avoid
Nicole.
VANNATTER: Is Nicole seeing anybody else that you-
O.J.: I have no idea. I really have absolutely no idea. I don't ask
her. I don't know. Her and her girlfriends, they go out, you
know, they've got some things going on right now with her
girlfriends, so I'm assuming something's happening because
one of the girlfriends is having a big problem with her
husband because she's always saying she's with Nicole until
three or four in the morning. She's not. You know, Nicole
tells me she leaves her at one thirty or two or two thirty, and
the girl doesn't get home until five, and she only lives a few
blocks away.
VANNATTER: Something's going on, huh?
LANGE: Do you know where they went, the family, for dinner last
night?
O.J.: No. Well, no, I didn't ask.
LANGE: I just thought maybe there's a regular place that they go.
O.J.: No. If I was with them, we'd go to Toscana. I mean, not
Toscano, Pepponi's.
VANNATTER: You haven't had any problems with her lately, have
you, O.J.?
O.J.: I always have problems with her, you know? Our
relationship has been a problem relationship. Probably
lately for me, and I say this only because I said it to Ron
yesterday at the—Ron Fishman, whose wife is Cora—at
the dance recital, when he came up to me and went,
“Oooh, boy, what's going on?” and everybody was beefing
with everybody. And I said, “Well, I'm just glad I'm out of
the mix.” You know, because I was like dealing with him
and his problems with his wife and Nicole and evidently
some new problems that a guy named Christian was having
with his girl, and she was staying at Nicole's house, and
something was going on, but I don't think it's pertinent
to this.
VANNATTER: Did Nicole have words with you last night?
O.J.: Pardon me?
VANNATTER: Did Nicole have words with you last night?
O.J.: No, not at all.
VANNATTER: Did you talk to her last night?
To ask to speak to my daughter, to congratulate my daughter,
and everything.
VANNATTER: But you didn't have a conversation with her?
O.J.: No, no.
VANATTER What were you wearing last night, O.J.?
What did I wear on the golf course yesterday? Some of these
kind of pants, some of these kind of pants—I mean I
changed different for whatever it was. I just had on some . . .
VANNATTER: Just these black pants?
O.J.: Just these. . . . They're called Bugle Boy.
VANNATTER: These aren't the pants?
O.J.: No.
VANNATTER: Where are the pants that you wore?
O.J.: They're hanging in my closet.
VANNATTER: These are washable, right? You just throw them in
the laundry?
O.J.: Yeah, I got a hundred pair. They give them to me free, Bugle
Boys, so I've got a bunch of them.
VANNATTER: Do you recall coming home and hanging them up,
or—?
O.J.: I always hang up my clothes. I mean, it's rare that I don't
hang up my clothes unless I'm laying them in my bathroom
for her to do something with them, but those are the only
things I don't hang up. But when you play golf, you don't
necessarily dirty pants.
LANGE: What kind of shoes were you wearing?
O.J.: Tennis shoes.
LANGE: Tennis shoes? Do you know what kind?
O.J.: Probably Reebok, that's all I wear.
LANGE: Are they at home, too?
O.J.: Yeah.
LANGE: Was this supposed to be a short trip to Chicago, so you
didn't take a whole lot?
O.J.: Yeah, I was coming back today.
LANGE: Just overnight?
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: That's a hectic schedule, drive back here to play golf
and come back.
O.J.: Yeah, but I do it all the time.
VANNATTER: Do you?
O.J.: Yeah. That's what I was complaining with the driver about,
you know, about my whole life is on and off airplanes.
VANNATTER: O.J., we've got sort of a problem.
O.J.: Mmm hmm.
VANNATTER: We've got some blood on and in your car, we've got
some blood at your house, and sort of a problem.
O.J.: Well, take my blood test.
LANGE: Well, we'd like to do that. We've got, of course, the cut on
your finger that you aren't real clear on. Do you recall having
that cut on your finger the last time you were at Nicole's
house?
O.J.: A week ago?
LANGE: Yeah.
O.J.: No. It was last night.
LANGE: Okay, so last night you cut it.
VANNATTER: Somewhere after the recital?
O.J.: Somewhere when I was rushing to get out of my house.
VANNATTER: Okay, after the recital.
O.J.: Yeah.
VANNATTER: What do you think happened? Do you have any
idea?
O.J.: I have no idea, man. You guys haven't told me anything. I
have no idea. When you said to my daughter, who said
something to me today, that somebody else might have been
involved, I have absolutely no idea what happened. I don't
know how, why or what. But you guys haven't told me
anything. Every time I ask you guys, you say you're going to
tell me in a bit.
VANNATTER: Well, we don't know a lot of answers to these
questions yet ourselves, O.J., okay?
O.J.: I've got a bunch of guns, guns all over the place. You can take
them, they're all there. I mean, you can see them. I keep
them in my car for an incident that happened a month ago
that my inlaws, my wife and everybody knows about that.
VANNATTER: What was that?
O.J.: Going down to. . . . And cops down there know about it
because I've told two marshals about it. At a mall, I was
going down for a christening, and I had just left—and it was
like three thirty in the morning, and I'm in a lane, and also
the car in front of me is going real slow, and I'm slowing
down 'cause I figure he sees a cop, 'cause we were all going
pretty fast. And I'm going to change lanes, but there's a car
next to me, and I can't change lanes. Then that goes for a
while, and I'm going o slow down and go around him but
the car butts up to me, and I'm like caught between three
cars. They were Oriental guys, and they were not letting me
go anywhere. And finally I went on the shoulder, and I sped
up, and then I held my phone up so they could see the light
part of it, you know, 'cause I have tinted windows, and they
kind of scattered, and I chased one of them for a while to
make him think I was chasing him before I took off.
LANGE: Were you in the Bronco?
O.J.: No.
LANGE: What were you driving?
O.J.: My Bentley. It has tinted windows and all, so I figured they
thought they had a nice little touch.
LANGE: Did you think they were trying to rip you off?
O.J.: Definitely, they were. And then the next thing, you know,
Nicole and I went home. At four in the morning I got there
to Laguna, and when we woke up, I told her about it, and
told her parents about it, told everybody about it, you know?
And when I saw two marshals at a mall, I walked up and told
them about it.
VANNATTER: What did they do, make a report on it?
O.J.: They didn't know nothing. I mean, they'll remember me and
remember I told them.
VANNATTER: Did Nicole mention that she'd been getting any
threats lately to you? Anything she was concerned about or
the kids' safety?
O.J.: To her?
VANNATTER: Yes.
O
.J.: From?
VANNATTER: From anybody.
O.J.: No, not at all.
VANNATTER: Was she very security conscious? Did she keep that
house locked up?
O.J.: Very.
VANNATTER: The intercom didn't work apparently, right?
O.J.: I thought it worked.
VANNATTER: Oh, okay. Does the electronic buzzer work?
O.J.: The electronic buzzer works to let people in.
VANNATTER: Do you ever park in the rear when you go over there?
O.J.: Most of the time.
VANNATTER: You do park in the rear.
O.J.: Most times when I'm taking the kids there, I come right into
the driveway, blow the horn, and she, or a lot of times the
housekeeper, either the housekeeper opens or they'll keep a
garage door open up on the top of the thing, you know, but
that's when I'm dropping the kids off, and I'm not going in.
There's times I go to the front because the kids have to hit
the buzzer and stuff.
VANNATTER: Did you say before that up until about three weeks
ago you guys were going out again and trying to-
O.J.: No, we'd been going out for about a year, and then the last
six months we've had—it ain't been working, so we tried
various things to see if we can make it work. We started
trying to date, and that wasn't working, and so, you know, we
just said the hell with it, you know.
VANNATTER: And that was about three weeks ago?
O.J.: Yeah, about three weeks ago.
VANNATTER: So you were seeing her up to that point?
O.J.: It's, it's—seeing her, yeah, I mean, yeah. It was a done deal. It
just wasn't happening. I mean, I was gone. I was in San Juan
doing a film, and I don't think we had sex since I've been
back from San Juan, and that was like two months ago. So
it's been like—for the kids we tried to do things together, you
know, we didn't really date each other. Then we decided let's
try to date each other. We went out one night, and it just
didn't work.
VANNATTER: When you say it didn't work, what do you mean?
O.J.: Ah, the night we went out it was fun. Then the next night we
went out it was actually when I was down in Laguna, and she
didn't want to go out. And I said, “Well, let's go out 'cause I
came all the way down here to go out,” and we kind of had a
beef. And it just didn't work after that, you know? We were
only trying to date to see if we could bring some romance
back into our relationship. We just said, let's treat each other
like boyfriend and girlfriend instead of, you know, like
seventeenyearold married people. I mean, seventeen years
together, whatever that is.
VANNATTER: How long were you together?
O.J.: Seventeen years.
VANNATTER: Seventeen years. Did you ever hit her, O.J.?
Ah, one night we had a fight. We had a fight, and she hit me.
And they never took my statement, they never wanted to