Journalists wait in vain for O.J. sightings
They sat in their lawn chairs, waiting.
All day. Since first thing in the morning, some said.
Nothing. Nada. Zip. Not a glimpse of The Juice, who arrived at his Kendall home after midnight Thursday following a four-hour flight from Las Vegas.
Sure, there were the rumors. O.J. had checked into the Seminole Hard Rock. He was playing a round of golf. He had slipped out of his house and was having lunch at a Kendall restaurant.
But no O.J. sightings at Simpson’s $1 million Kendall spread — to the chagrin of waiting reporters.
There was, however, the long-time girlfriend. As Christie Prody drove down the driveway — leaving, returning, leaving, returning — she always smiled into the cameras and the lights to let them know O.J. was just fine.
”People need to know that he hasn’t done anything wrong,” Prody added, before someone in the house yelled for the writers and photographers to leave her alone.
Outside O.J.’s home were journalists from Entertainment Tonight, Fox News, Associated Press, local television stations, paparazzi photographers and one high school TV station.
Some said they’d been entrenched since 8 a.m.; all said they didn’t know how long they would stay.
They are there, of course, to cover Simpson, the former football star charged with kidnapping, robbery with use of a deadly weapon, burglary while in possession of a deadly weapon, coercion with use of a deadly weapon, assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to commit robbery and conspiracy to commit a crime. He has not entered a plea.
The media crush was not fun for neighbors.
On the two-lane road past his house, traffic slowed to a crawl. A pickup truck and a minivan had a fender bender just at rush hour.
Someone posted ”No Trespassing” signs at the driveway’s entrance.
No one left.