“I recognised his voice”: Potential witness in O.J. Simpson case reveals new details about the night of the murders in Netflix docuseries

Two individuals who claim to have encountered O.J. Simpson on June 12, 1994, when his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman were murdered outside her luxury condo, are now sharing their accounts in a new docuseries, decades after they were excluded from the murder trial. Simpson was famously cleared of the murders, but the accounts of those who witnessed the events are now being shared.

The O.J. Simpson murder trial is one of the most notorious in American history, and it continues to fascinate those who took part and the public in general. Decades on, two people who say they met Simpson on the evening of June 12, 1994—the night his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman, were brutally murdered—are now stepping forward with what they witnessed. Even though they claimed to have knowledge of that fateful evening, they were never summoned to give evidence at the trial, and their testimonies remained unheard until today.
Simpson, the erstwhile NFL player, was acquited of the murders in a sensationalized trial that polarized the country. Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman, a wannabe actor, were brutally stabbed outside her mansion-like Brentwood residence in Los Angeles. The criminal court acquited Simpson on all counts, but the case has been a subject of virulent scrutiny and speculation ever since.

A new Netflix docu-series, American Manhunt: O.J. Simpson, released in January, digs deeper into the case, uncovering details overlooked and illuminating lesser-known information about the investigation. The show includes exclusive interviews, including one with potential key witnesses who said they saw Simpson on the evening of the killings but were never called to testify in court. Their disclosures lend further depth to a case that still provokes controversy and fascination decades on.
"I could see who it was and I knew it was a football player, but I wasn't sure who. He was yelling at another driver, 'Move, move.' I recognised his voice because I had just seen a Naked Gun film. It was O.J. Simpson," Jill Shively, a Santa Monica resident at the time, revealed to People magazine.
Shively, a mother raising her daughter, sold her story to Hard Copy, leading prosecutor Marcia Clark to delay calling her as a witness during the trial. "Marcia thought that tainted any testimony she might provide," reflected Chris Darden, who served as Clark's co-counsel on the case, in American Manhunt.
Skip Junis, another potential witness, claimed to have seen O.J. Simpson arriving at Los Angeles International Airport around 11:30pm, awaiting his wife's arrival, when he saw a limousine stop 40 feet away. "O.J. went to a trash can and plopped the bag on top. What was really peculiar is when he unzipped the bag, he pulled out a long item that was covered with a white rag or cloth and put it in the trash can," Junis recollected.
Also Read: NFL Legend to a murderer: Revisiting the controversial life and career of O.J. Simpson
Reflecting on being forgotten as a witness, Junis believes that the legal team simply "forgot about him." It wasn't until later that he learned from detectives that prosecutor Marcia Clark made a conscious decision not to call him as a witness, wondering if he could properly substantiate his claims. The incident is still very much etched in his memory, and he continues to think about that fateful night, wondering what role he could have played in the case.