O.J. Says Book Wasn't a Confession

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O.J. Simpson said in a radio interview Wednesday that his ill-fated "If I Did It" book and TV project was not a confession to the murders of his ex-wife and her friend and that the title wasn't his idea. "I made it clear from the first day I met the writer that I wasn't involved," Simpson, who lives in the Miami suburbs, said in a telephone interview broadcast on WTPS-AM radio. "I said, 'I have nothing to confess.'" Simpson also said the reported advance payment figure of $3.5 million was inaccurate. Although he would not specify how much he was paid, he did say it was a "windfall" that would go mainly to pay bills and support his children. "Would everybody stop being so naive? Of course I got paid," Simpson said with a laugh. "I spend the money on my bills. It's gone." Simpson's interview came two days after News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch canceled the book and two-part interview that had been scheduled to air Nov. 27 and Nov. 29 on the company's Fox TV network. All copies of the book will be destroyed, officials with publisher HarperCollins have said. The cancellation came amid an intensely negative nationwide reaction to what was being billed as a thinly-veiled confession by Simpson to the 1994 murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ron Goldman. Simpson was acquitted in 1995. In the Miami radio interview, Simpson was asked point-blank if he killed the pair. "Absolutely not, and I maintained my innocence from day one," he replied, adding a little later: "No matter what everybody wants to say, I didn't do it." As for the "If I Did It" title, he added: "That was their title. That's what they came up with. I didn't pitch anything. I don't make book deals." Simpson also accused the Goldman family which won a $33.5 million civil wrongful death judgment against him of "opening up those old wounds" on frequent TV appearances. "It happens every month to me. Everybody's calling me names," Simpson said. Simpson said he was approached about the book and TV project, which he viewed as fiction but also as an opportunity to describe more fully his life with Nicole, their post-divorce relationship and other personal details. What he labeled "the incident" is covered in about half a chapter and involves a fictional character named "Charlie," Simpson said. Details about the killings were purely the creation of the writer, he added. "If the prosecution read it, they would say 'well, this is impossible,'" Simpson said. Simpson also said he is weary of the constant media attention focused on him, suggesting it would be better to focus on solving cases such as the recent shooting death of University of Miami football player Bryan Pata. "There are a lot of unsolved murders, a lot of tragedy over the last 12 years," Simpson said.