News Corp. Giveth, The Judge Taketh Away

By Neal 

ojsimpson-inrepose.jpgEarlier this week, O.J. Simpson shot his mouth off to yet another reporter about how he never liked the If I Did It manuscript and its description of the murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman at his hands, because “there were a lot of inaccuracies about the case and about how I would have done things,” he said. “But I figure I’d let it go since I didn’t kill anyone.” And besides, he added, “I got paid just the same.”

That statement probably didn’t sit well with California Superior Court judge Gerald Rosenberg, who expanded upon an earlier ruling in the lawsuit that Fred Goldman has filed against the hypothetical murderer to put a freeze on the advance money in addition to all the other money Simpson has made on prior book and movie deals. (The If I Did It advance was exempted from the original prohibition, adds Dan Whitcomb of Reuters, because it was covered in a separate federal lawsuit which has since been dismissed.) Although Variety suggested back in November that the If I Did It rights were about to revert back to Simpson, if they hadn’t already, the current reportage places the rights in HarperCollins‘ hands…with the twist that “Simpson owns his story and could shop it to other publishers in another form.”