Prison for O.J.
The crime that sent O.J. Simpson to prison seems petty compared to the accusation that history will remember him for: the brutal 1994 murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman in Brentwood, Los Angeles. The ex-sports star, once one of the most popular athletes in the country, was acquitted of those killings in a trial that divided a tabloid-obsessed nation along racial lines. (He would later lose a 1997 "wrongful death" suit which awarded millions of dollars to the Goldman and Brown families.) But, in October 2008, he was found guilty of several felonies as part of a 2007 break-in in a Las Vegas hotel. The case involved sports memorabilia and personal mementoes he claimed were still his — but were the property of two dealers. In December 2008, a judge imposed a complex series of penalties on Simpson. He could spend as many as 33 years in prison but is eligible for parole in nine.