The executor of O.J. Simpson’s estate says he will work to prevent a payout of a $33.5 million judgment awarded by a California civil jury nearly three decades ago in a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the families of Simpson’s ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her de her friend Ron Goldman.
Simpson’s will was filed Friday in a Clark County court in Nevada, naming his longtime lawyer, Malcolm LaVergne, as the executor. The document shows Simpson’s property was placed into a trust that was created this year.
LaVergne told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that the entirety of Simpson’s estate has not been tallied. Under Nevada law, an estate must go through the courts if its assets exceed $20,000.
Simpson died Wednesday without having paid the lion’s share of the civil judgment that was awarded in 1997 after jurors found him liable. With his assets set to go through the court probate process, the Goldman and Brown families could be in line to get paid a piece of whatever Simpson left behind.
LaVergne, who had represented Simpson since 2009, said he specifically didn’t want the Goldman family seeing any money from Simpson’s estate.
“It’s my hope that the Goldmans get zero, nothing,” he told the Review-Journal. “Them specifically. And I will do everything in my capacity as the executor or personal representative to try and ensure that they get nothing.”
LaVergne did not immediately return phone and email messages left by The Associated Press on Saturday.
Although the Brown and Goldman families have pushed for payment, LaVergne said there was never a court order forcing Simpson to pay the civil judgment. The attorney told the Review-Journal that his particular ire of him at the Goldman family stemmed in part from the events surrounding Simpson’s planned book, titled “If I Did It.”
Goldman’s family won control of the manuscript and retitled the book “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer.”
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