O.J. Simpson defense attorney remembers former football star as "extremely warm, personable"
FOLSOM — In the Northern California city of Folsom, one defense attorney remembers O.J. Simpson as a former client and later a friend.
"He was an extremely warm, personable person," Robert Blasier said. "Very nice to deal with. Very easy to deal with it. He did have a huge ego."
It was a complex day for Blasier after learning of Simpson's death from prostate cancer at the age of 76.
"I lived with him for a year after the criminal case because I did the civil case as well," Blasier said.
Blasier was a part of the defense team that defended the former football star when he was acquitted of the 1994 killings of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman, a case that gripped the nation.
"That was clear from the very beginning. This was going to be the trial of the century," Blasier said.
In the wake of Simpson's death, Blasier spoke to CBS13 about his time with Simpson during the case and after.
"He was very stoic about it. He didn't seem to be affected by it," Blasier said.
So what did he believe about Simpson in the wake of the case?
"I can't make those kind of judgments. I don't," he said. "Once they make me a judge, I can do that. That's my role."
What Blasier remembers are smaller, intimate moments with Simpson in the year of the civil trial.
"He and I sat and watched the movie Ghost, and we both cried," Blasier said. "We were kind of on the same page there. It's a corny movie, but it's a crier and he cried his eyes out just like I did."
He called Simpson three weeks ago but never was able to connect with him. Now, he looks back on the man who became a major part of Blasier's own life.
"I do get a lot of people that know that didn't know me before and there are a lot of people that don't like me because I was a part of the case, and that's OK too. I just stay away from those people," he said.
Blasier said that his final call to Simpson was for permission to finally write about his experience in the trial.
