The Los Angeles Police Department confirmed Friday that a knife found on the property that once belonged to O.J. Simpson is being tested.
The folding buck knife had been found by a construction worker when Simpson’s house was being demolished “back in the ’90s,” TMZ first reported. The worker then gave that knife to an off-duty police officer who kept it as a souvenir for years thinking that the case had been closed.
LAPD Capt. Andrew Neiman said at press conference Friday morning that the officer was a traffic cop and working on a movie set when he was given the knife.
The Robbery-Homicide Division is now investigating the knife for forensics, which detectives learned of only within the last month when the office retired and told another officer about it.
Neiman confirmed most of the details of the TMZ report, but did not say how the retired officer got the knife.
Because Simpson was never found criminally guilty in the June 12, 1994, murders of Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman, it is still an open case. Police can continue investigating it, but Simpson cannot be prosecuted again because of double jeopardy laws.
No weapon was ever found or introduced at trial. The former football star was acquitted in 1995.
However, in October 2008, Simpson was found guilty on 12 criminal counts in connection with a September 2007 robbery in Las Vegas and sentenced to at least 33 years in jail, with parole eligibility after nine years.
Interest in Simpson has returned since FX debuted a series in February on him called “American Crime Story: The People vs. O.J. Simpson.”
