O.J.’s executor says he wants Goldmans to get ‘zero, nothing’ from estate

O.J. Simpson’s longtime lawyer and executor of his estate said Friday that he will fight to prevent the payout of a $33.5 million judgment awarded to the families of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.

Attorney Malcolm LaVergne, who had represented Simpson since 2009, told the Review-Journal in a phone interview that he specifically does not want the Goldman family seeing any money from Simpson’s estate.

“It’s my hope that the Goldmans get zero, nothing,” LaVergne said. “Them specifically. And I will do everything in my capacity as the executor or personal representative to try and ensure that they get nothing.”

Court documents filed Friday revealed Simpson’s final will, which named LaVergne the executor in charge of overseeing the estate. Simpson’s family announced his death Thursday, a day after he died from prostate cancer.

After rising to fame as a football star, Simpson was then known as the man accused of brutally killing Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman in June 1994. He was acquitted of the murders in a monthslong, highly publicized Los Angeles trial.

LaVergne said Simpson had been diagnosed with prostate cancer “several years ago,” and that it had gone into remission before recently returning. Simpson died in hospice care at his home in Rhodes Ranch, in the southwest Las Vegas Valley, LaVergne said.

The will places all of Simpson’s property into a trust that was created in January, court filings show. LaVergne said the entirety of Simpson’s estate has not been tallied.

“I can’t make a predication right now as to what the value of the estate is,” LaVergne said.

LaVergne said he was taken by surprise to be named the estate’s executor.

“I am flummoxed as to why he would name me as the personal representative or the executor, but he did,” he said. “And it’s something I’m going to take very seriously.”

Among LaVergne’s responsibilities as personal representative is to pay for the cost of a “suitable monument” at Simpson’s grave, according to the will. It also said Simpson desired “that this Will be administered as set forth herein without litigation or dispute of any kind” and that any beneficiary, heir “or any other person” seeks to establish a claim on the will, “or attack, oppose or seek to set aside the administration of this Will, have this Will declared null, void or diminish, or to defeat any change any part of the provisions of this will,” they “shall receive, free of trust, one dollar ($1.00) and no more in lieu of any claimed interest in this will or its assets.”

In 1997, Simpson was found liable in a civil wrongful death lawsuit, and was ordered to pay millions in damages to the families of Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson.

LaVergne said that although the families have pushed for payment, there was never a court order forcing Simpson to pay out the civil judgment. He said his particular ire at the Goldman family came in part due to the events surrounding Simpson’s controversial planned book, titled “If I Did It.”

Goldman’s family, still pursuing the wrongful death judgment, won control of the manuscript and retitled the book “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer,” according to the Associated Press.

Simpson said he lived only on his NFL and private pensions. Hundreds of valuable possessions were seized as part of the civil jury award, and Simpson was forced to auction his Heisman Trophy, fetching $230,000, the Associated Press has reported.

Simpson later faced legal trouble in Las Vegas, and was convicted of a 2007 robbery of sports memorabilia from a Palace Station hotel room. Simpson was sentenced to between nine and 33 years behind bars.

He was released from prison in 2017, and granted an early discharge from parole in 2021 by the Nevada Board of Parole Commissioners.

LaVergne said Simpson is due to be cremated in the coming days, but that funeral arrangements have not been finalized.

Contact Katelyn Newberg at knewberg@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0240.