O.J. Makes Request for Bail

July 13, 2009 by  
Filed under Sports, US

OJ Simpson

OJ Simpson

By The Associated Press

LAS VEGAS (AP) — O.J. Simpson is promising not to disappear or endanger the community if he’s freed from prison pending his appeal in an armed hotel room heist, his lawyers told the Nevada Supreme Court.

“Simpson recognizes that he has a heavy burden in demonstrating that his release will pose no danger to the community and that he is not a flight risk,” attorneys Yale Galanter and Malcolm LaVergne said in a follow-up document filed Monday with the state’s only appellate court. “Simpson will strictly adhere to whatever conditions this court sets for bond.”

A three-member panel of Nevada Supreme Court justices plans oral arguments Aug. 3 in Las Vegas on Simpson’s request to post unspecified bond while the seven-member court considers his appeal.

This week’s filing followed an initial appeal for bail filed May 28.

The new papers include an affidavit from one of the two memorabilia dealers robbed in the September 2007 encounter, renewing his allegation that Clark County District Attorney David Roger wouldn’t let him drop the charges against Simpson.

“I wanted all of the charges against O.J. Simpson dropped,” Alfred Beardsley said in the document. “After I testified, the Clark County district attorney’s office fabricated the idea that the reason I was a reluctant witness was because Mr. Simpson had intimidated, threatened or promised me something of value.”

The two-page affidavit also referred to Beardsley’s denial before a judge in Santa Monica, Calif., that he received Simpson’s NFL Hall of Fame ring to change his story in the Las Vegas case.

“Mr. Simpson has never promised me anything for me to testify the way I did,” Beardsley said.

Simpson, 61, is serving nine to 33 years for kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon in the gunpoint robbery of Beardsley and memorabilia broker Bruce Fromong in a Las Vegas hotel room in 2007.

A lawyer for Simpson’s convicted co-defendant, Clarence “C.J.” Stewart, said Stewart also plans to file follow-up bail request documents before a separate Aug. 3 hearing by the state Supreme Court panel.

Roger has filed documents asking the state high court to keep Simpson locked up, citing the length of his sentence and Simpson’s admission in 2008 that he violated a court order by trying to contact a co-defendant before trial.

Simpson’s lawyers say Clark County District Court Judge Jackie Glass never made a specific finding that Simpson was a flight risk or a danger to the public.

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