O.J.’s Parole: A Fitting End to the ‘Fifth Quarter’

As expected, O.J. Simpson was granted parole today in Nevada, after serving nearly nine years of a 33-year sentence at the Lovelock Correctional Center. Barring any infractions over the next three months, he will be released in October. The parole hearing, simulcast on all the cable networks and ESPN, was nothing pretty, neither cinematic nor illustrative. Simpson made roundly mocked and altogether clueless statements, such as “I’ve led a conflict-free life” and “Nobody has ever accused me of pulling a weapon on anybody,” as if he was never involved in the murder trial of the century or had an acknowledged past as a domestic abuser. Yet this wasn’t a parole hearing that had anything to do with the murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman, and this is why the decision of the parole board, as much as it may rankle some, was correct and just. Read More…