Did Fox Try To Buy Brown Family’s Silence On O.J.? Company Says No

By Dylan on November 21, 2006 3:00 PM

Just when the O.J. book case couldn’t get any weirder, Denise Brown showed up on Today today and accused New Corp. of trying to buy her family’s silence about the O.J. book for “millions of dollars.” A spokesman for Fox confirmed to the AP that the company had conversations with representatives of Nicole Brown Simpson‘s and Ron Goldman‘s families over the past week and that the families were offered all profits from the planned Simpson book and television show, but he denied that it was “hush money.”

More O.J. fallout and analysis:

BusinessWeek‘s Jon Fine: News Corp. made a number of stunning miscalculations in the handling of O.J. Simpson’s sort-of-confessional If I Did It, and chief among them is that it forgot the difference between the book business and the TV business.

In watching Matt Lauer conduct the Brown interview, we were reminded of Lauer’s predecessor Bryant Gumbel, who was one of O.J.’s biggest supporters. On a September 30, 1996 Today show broadcast, Gumbel asked Johnnie Cochran: “Why do you suppose it is that one year after his acquittal, most white Americans at least, cannot accept the idea that he’s out walking around free, refuse to let him live his life?”
LAT: One News Corp. executive said that scheduling the program represented “a severe underestimating of the American public” by company executives Peter Chernin and Peter Liguori.
Ron Goldman’s father: “We want to say thank you, thank you for everyone in this country who raised their voice and stood up for the right thing.”
CNN Poll via HuffPo: 55% thought the project was offensive, while 30% thought it was inappropriate.