Suit Simpson Wore to ’95 Acquittal Will Be Offered to Smithsonian
CNN, March 2, 2010
The brownish-green suit that O.J. Simpson wore the day he was acquitted of murder in what has often been described as the “trial of the century” will be donated to the Smithsonian Institution–if the museum wants it.
A judge has approved the transfer Monday, said Fred Goldman, the father of the man the ex-National Football League star was accused of killing.
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The highly publicized trial lasted more than nine months and ended on October 3, 1995, with a jury finding Simpson not guilty.
Later, Brown and Goldman families took Simpson to civil court to seek damages for wrongful death. That jury found Simpson liable for the deaths and awarded $8.5 million in compensatory damages to the Goldman family and to Ron Goldman’s biological mother.
Since then, Fred Goldman has been trying to collect the money. Simpson has consistently said he did not kill the two and should not have to pay.
In 2008, Gilbert, the sports agent, appeared on the “Dr. Phil” television show, claiming he had the suit and pants Simpson wore on the day of the acquittal. He also said the “acquittal suit”–as it came to be known–was worth $50,000.
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The Superior Court judge ordered the suit donated to the Smithsonian. If the museum passes on it, it will be offered to another museum.
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The Smithsonian is taking a pass on O.J.
The venerable museum has no intention of accepting the so-called “lucky suit” that O.J. Simpson wore the day a jury found him not guilty of murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
“We had a quick meeting with our curatorial team this morning and decided this wouldn’t be anything we’d collect. It’s just not appropriate for our collection,” Smithsonian National Museum of American History spokeswoman Valeska Hilbig told the Daily News.
The khaki suit was one of the items O.J. Simpson, 62, hoped to recover when he led a group of thugs on an armed robbery at a Las Vegas hotel in 2007.
He never got the suit, and he’s now serving a minimum nine-year prison sentence in Nevada for the botched heist.
The disgraced NFL star told the judge and lawyers by phone Monday that he didn’t object to donating the suit “as long as no one made a profit from it,” his attorney Ronald P. Slates said.
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