'Between a Rock and a Hard Place': O.J. Book Battle Rages On

May 4, 2007 — -- Strange bedfellows indeed.

Denise Brown is putting the publishing world on notice that whoever buys the rights to O.J. Simpson's fictional confession, "If I Did It," can expect a public backlash - from domestic violence victims and others who believe publishing the book would be an outrage.

"This book is a manual for murder," Brown told ABC News' Law & Justice Unit. "We can't afford in our country for this to happen again. Look at [last month's] Virginia Tech [shootings]. There's so much stuff going on in our society - we can't have a manual out there in black and white."

.

It's the same warning that Fred Goldman sounded last fall, when news of the book and two part Fox television interview first surfaced. And he was right - Harper Collins pulled the book and canceled the special in the wake of public disgust.

But now it's Goldman who's trying to sell the book rights, and Simpson who is trying to stop the sale.

And Brown has found herself in the unlikely position of landing on the same legal side as Simpson, as both try to stop Goldman from selling the book rights, a position she describes as like being "between a rock and a hard place.''

Her father, Louis, is the executor of Nicole Brown Simpson's estate, which represents the interests of Simpson's children Justin and Sidney.

She told ABC News it was frustrating that she was the only one in this puzzling legal triangle whose position on the book had remained consistent."Goldman's switched his tune. Simpson's changed his tune," Brown told ABC News' Law & Justice Unit. "We have not."

Brown, who travels the country advocating for domestic violence victims, said she knew her time was better spent on that work than going to court every time Simpson turned up in the news, but she said she had an obligation to protect the rights of Simpson's children.

"We are not going to be the ones to go out and pursue these [legal actions]," she said, "but if the Goldmans do something, we have to react, because we have to protect the interests of Sidney and Justin."

"These kids mean a hell of a lot to me," she said. "Every time I go out and speak, one of the questions I always get is, 'How are the kids doing?'"

Sidney is in college in Boston and Justin goes to school in Tallahassee, Fla., Brown said.

"The whole country is concerned about these kids. Growing up and having a father the whole world believes murdered their mother and Ron Goldman … is very difficult."

"They love their dad, and however hard that is for me to say, it's true."

In 1995, Simpson was found not guilty of murder in the slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Ron Goldman in a criminal case. In 1997, a jury in a civil lawsuit found him liable for the deaths and awarded the Goldman and Brown families $33.5 million.

Goldman's relentless pursuit of Simpson's money stems from his decadelong attempt to collect on that judgment. The trouble began in the fall when Harper Collins' publisher Judith Regan announced the book and television package for "If I Did It."

Public outrage was loud and bitter. Goldman launched an online petition on a Web site called "Don't Pay O.J." that received tens of thousands of signatures, and News Corp., Harper Collins' parent company, pulled the book.

News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch offered the Browns and Goldmans a rare public apology. A few months later, Regan was terminated.But Goldman saw an opening -- he went to court and demanded the rights to the book as part of a still unpaid $37 million civil judgment. He won.

Soon Simpson's lawyers were in court trying to stop the publication. And now lawyers for Brown and her father, Louis, on behalf of Simpson's children, plan to bid on the book to stop it from being published, using a "credit bid."

The move would allow the Brown Simpson estate to bid up to $24 million -- the value of the estate's judgment -- for the book. But that auction could still be a long way off -- attorneys for Lorraine Brooks Associates, the business set up to receive the Harper Collins money from the scuttled deal, went to court last month and filed for bankruptcy.

The book's public auction will not be held until a bankruptcy judge has sorted out the company's finances. That is fine with Brown. She has never read the book.

But she is aware of excerpts published in Newsweek magazine, which gives a chilling account of what may have happened that night in Brentwood, Calif.

The memories of that night and the aftermath of the infamous white Bronco car chase and the murder trial are still painful, Brown said.

The Night in Question

In his fictional "confession" to the murders, Simpson writes that he killed the pair because Brown Simpson was taunting him and charged at him like a "banshee."

He lost control of himself, according to excerpts of the crucial chapter that was published in Newsweek.

Furious at his wife for taunting him over her sexual indiscretions, he drives to her home and enters through a back door brandishing a knife he keeps in his car to ward off the "crazies" in Los Angeles.

He writes that he wants to "scare" her. He is wearing the knit cap and gloves he keeps in his car to stave off the early morning chill on California's golf courses.

Brown Simpson shrieks at him. Her dog gives a friendly tail wag to Goldman, who has arrived to return her mother's glasses, which she left at the restaurant Goldman worked at earlier in the evening.

The dog's reaction confirms to Simpson that Goldman is a familiar presence in the home.

"You've been here before," Simpson screams at the young man. His ex-wife angrily demands that Simpson leave him alone, and then charges at him. She slips, falls and smashes her head hard on the floor.

Then Simpson writes that he blacks out. "Then something went horribly wrong," he writes. "And I know what happened, but I can't tell you exactly how."

When he comes to, he is holding a bloody knife over the mutilated bodies of his ex-wife and Goldman. He panics, according to this account.

He heads back outside to the alley, strips off everything but his socks, and rolls the bloody clothes into a small pile. He then returns to his Rockingham estate, slipping past a car waiting to take him to the airport.

He famously bangs into the air conditioner outside the guest house where Kato Kaelin is staying.

Throughout, he is aided by a friend he calls "Charlie." There was no evidence at the criminal trial that Simpson had an accomplice.