Ron Goldman

The rights to Simpson's book, If I Did It, a first-person account of how he would have committed the murders had he committed them, were awarded to the Goldman family in August 2007. They were granted the proceeds from the book in 2007 as part of the multi-million dollar civil jury award against him they had been trying to collect for over a decade. They own the copyright, media rights, and movie rights.

They also acquired Simpson's name, likeness, life story, and right of publicity in connection with the book, according to court documents, ensuring he would not be able to profit from the book. After renaming the book If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer, the Goldman family published it in September 2007 through Beaufort Books.

Simpson was tried for the murders of both Brown and Goldman. In October 1995, after a public trial that lasted nearly nine months, he was acquitted. In a 1997 civil trial, a jury found him liable for the wrongful death of Goldman and awarded the Goldman family millions of dollars. Simpson was subsequently jailed for an unrelated armed robbery at a Las Vegas hotel in 2008.

According to a June 15, 1994 Los Angeles Times article published three days after his death, Goldman probably met Brown six weeks before they were killed, when he borrowed her Lamborghini. They grew increasingly friendly, accompanying each other to dance clubs, and meeting for coffee and dinner during the month-and-a-half before they died. According to police and friends, their relationship was platonic. According to the article, he had borrowed her car when he met his friend, Craig Clark, for lunch. According to Clark, he told him it was her car, but that he did not say she was his girlfriend. "He said they were friends."

On the evening of Sunday, June 12, 1994, Goldman worked a server shift at Mezzaluna Trattoria, a restaurant at 11750 San Vicente Boulevard in Brentwood. Brown called to report that her mother accidentally left her sunglasses on the table when they dined there earlier in the day. Goldman was not their server. After a search turned up the glasses in a street gutter outside the restaurant, Goldman agreed to drop them at her home after work.

Goldman had also expressed aspirations to act and to be on a show, and he appeared as a contestant on the short-lived game show Studs in 1992. He had dated Jacqui Bell for nearly two years before she broke off their relationship three months before his death.

Ronald Lyle Goldman (July 2, 1968 – June 12, 1994) was an American restaurant waiter and a friend of Nicole Brown Simpson, the ex-wife of O. J. Simpson. He was murdered along with Brown at her home in Los Angeles, California, on June 12, 1994. Simpson was acquitted of their murders in 1995, but found liable for both deaths in a 1997 civil lawsuit.

Goldman was born on July 2, 1968. He grew up in the community of Buffalo Grove, Illinois, near Chicago. His parents divorced in 1974 when he was six and, after spending a brief time in the custody of his mother, Sharon (Fohrman) Rufo, he was raised by his father, Fred Goldman, and lived with him and his younger sister, Kim Goldman.

Goldman was murdered a few weeks shy of his 26th birthday. He is buried at Pierce Brothers Valley Oaks Memorial Park in Westlake Village, California.