Revealed. Kim Goldman, the sister of the late Ron Goldman, who was murdered alongside Nicole Brown Simpson more than two decades ago, opened up to Meredith Vieira about why she requested to visit with O. J. Simpson in prison.
"I feel that I needed to be the last face that he saw," Goldman said of the request. "My brother was found with his eyes open… If you believe the testimony that he was lying dying for about a minute watching his killer walk away, and I needed to be the last face that the killer saw. That was important to me."
Ron, a waiter and aspiring model, was murdered at age 25, alongside O. J. Simpson's ex-wife, Nicole, outside of her home in L.A.'s Brentwood neighborhood in June 1994. While evidence pointed to Simpson — one of the most celebrated running backs in NFL history — he was ultimately found "not guilty" after an eight-month trial that was scrutinized by the media and public in 1995.
In 2008, Simpson was incarcerated at the Lovelock Correctional Center in Nevada, after he was found guilty on charges of armed robbery, kidnapping, and several other felonies. Simpson, now 68, was sentenced up to to 33 years behind bars.
Since then, the Goldman family has struggled with forgiving Simpson and members of the jury, who made their decision in four hours. In fact, Goldman even authored a book titled, Can't Forgive, which tells the story about the aftermath of her brother's murder and how it changed her life. She's also authored a new book, Media Circus, the first collective look at ordinary, grieving victims who were forced to manage their very private trauma and despair in a very public way.
"It wasn’t about words," Goldman told Vieira of wanting to see Simpson behind bars. "Because I never felt anything I would ever say would penetrate him. It was about showing him that he didn’t take everything from me. He took something really important but he didn’t break me."
Ultimately, Goldman decided against meeting with Simpson. "I didn’t get past needing to sign a confidentially agreement that I would never speak of it, and I would have to deny it ever happened," she dished. "So I was not willing to do that."
The show also featured a meeting between Goldman and a former jury member Yolanda Crawford.
"I just want to express my sympathy for the loss of your family and I’m sorry I couldn’t give you what you were looking for," Crawford said to Goldman on the show. "I felt like we followed the instructions of the Judge and of the system and it called for a not guilty verdict because of I want to say the reasonable doubt and that was there in the case for us."
Goldman described the first-time meeting as "awkward and a little uncomfortable" and explained why. "I’m just struggling a little, because I don’t agree and the decision 12 jurors made changed the trajectory of my life and our family's life and it’s hard to understand how two people can sit in the same exact room and hear the same evidence and come to two completely different thoughts."
According to Crawford, she's since struggled with doubts about the jurors' decision. "I don’t know of his innocence, I’m not sure about that I’ve always had some doubt," she shared. "There was evidence that was put in the civil trial that we weren’t privy to during the criminal trial."
Watch part of the segment above, and tune in tp watch the full episode of The Meredith Vieira Show on Tuesday, Sept. 22.
