As with most of these campaigns against individuals, this one too ended not with a bang but a whimper.
Costs and fees
After the judge ruled against Simpson, the only remaining issue was how much he would owe in damages.
DirecTV had requested $20,000 under each of two separate laws, for a total of $40,000. The judge noted that Simpson had not “used the devices commercially or for resale,” so she declined to award the full request. Instead, DirecTV got $15,000 in damages under the first statute and $10,000 under the second, for a total of $25,000.
The higher cost, though, came from legal fees. DirecTV submitted a motion for Simpson to pay its lawyers after his loss, and the judge agreed to a $33,678 legal bill.
The court granted final judgment on November 29, 2005, ruling that “the Juice” owed DirecTV a grand total of $58,678. It was pricey, yes—but in a way, Simpson got off cheap. When the recording industry launched its own mass lawsuit campaign, college students and single moms were eventually hit with $675,000 or even $1.92 million verdicts.
With that final judgment, another in the long string of court cases that defined Simpson’s later years came to an end.
Simpson soon had bigger problems than TV piracy, though; two years later, in September 2007, he and some men with guns burst into a hotel room at the Palace Station in Las Vegas and, in just six minutes, committed the acts that finally put him in prison.
Being branded a satellite TV pirate is not going to define O.J.’s legacy, of course. At best, the story is a minor footnote. But it remains a fascinating example of what happens when an anti-piracy, mass-lawsuit campaign sweeps up a celebrity like “the Juice”—and squeezes him for $58,678.
