By: History.com Editors

1994

O.J. Simpson leads L.A. police on a low-speed chase

History.com Editors

Published: January 27, 2010

Last Updated: March 02, 2025

Viewers across the nation are glued to their television screens on June 17, 1994, watching as a fleet of black-and-white police cars pursues a white Ford Bronco along Interstate 405 in Los Angeles, California. Inside the Bronco is Orenthal James “O.J.” Simpson, a former professional football player, actor and sports commentator whom police suspected of involvement in the recent murders of his former wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman.

The bodies of Brown Simpson and Goldman were found outside her home in the exclusive Los Angeles neighborhood of Brentwood shortly after midnight on June 13, 1994. Bloodstains matching Simpson’s blood type were found at the crime scene, and the star had become the focus of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) investigation by the morning of June 17. When police arrived to arrest Simpson at the home of his friend and lawyer, Robert Kardashian, they found that Simpson had slipped out the back door with his former college and Buffalo Bills teammate Al Cowlings. The two men had then driven off in Cowlings’ white Ford Bronco.

After a news conference—in which his lawyer, Robert Shapiro, announced that Simpson was distraught and might attempt suicide—the LAPD officially declared the former football star a fugitive. Around 7 p.m. PST, police located the white Bronco by tracing calls made from Simpson’s cellular phone. Simpson was reported to be in the back seat of the vehicle, holding a gun to his head. With news helicopters following the slow chase from above and cameras broadcasting the dramatic events live to millions of astonished viewers, vehicles from the LAPD and California Highway Patrol pursued the Bronco for about an hour as it traveled at some 35 miles per hour along I-405. Finally, after about an hour, the Bronco pulled into the driveway of Simpson’s Brentwood home. He emerged from the car close to 9 pm and was immediately arrested and booked on double murder charges.

The trial that followed gripped the nation, inspiring unprecedented media scrutiny along with heated debates about racial discrimination on the part of the police. Though a jury acquitted Simpson of the murder charges in October 1995, a separate civil trial in 1997 found him liable for the deaths and ordered him to pay $33.5 million in damages to the Brown and Goldman families.

In 2007, Simpson ran into legal problems once again when he was arrested for breaking into a Las Vegas hotel room and taking sports memorabilia, which he claimed had been stolen from him, at gunpoint. On October 3, 2008, he was found guilty of 12 charges related to the incident, including armed robbery and kidnapping, and sentenced to 33 years in prison. He was released from prison in October, 2017, and died of cancer on April 11, 2024.

O.J. Simpson’s Getaway Car: What Happened to the White Ford Bronco?

One company wanted to hawk tourist rides in it—along the infamous 405 freeway chase route.

Motorists stop and wave as police cars pursue the Ford Bronco driven by Al Cowlings, carrying fugitive murder suspect O.J. Simpson, on a 90-minute slow-speed car chase June 17, 1994 on the 405 freeway in Los Angeles, California.

By: Natasha Frost

Timeline

Also on This Day in History

Discover more of the major events, famous births, notable deaths and everything else history-making that happened on June 17th

1775

Battle of Bunker Hill begins

British General Thomas Gage lands his troops on the Charlestown Peninsula overlooking Boston, Massachusetts, and leads them against Breed’s Hill, a fortified American position just below Bunker Hill, on June 17, 1775.

1876

Native Americans score victory at the Battle of the Rosebud

Sioux and Cheyenne Native Americans score a tactical victory over General Crook’s forces at the Battle of the Rosebud, foreshadowing the disaster of the Battle of the Little Big Horn eight days later.

1885

Statue of Liberty arrives in New York Harbor

On June 17, 1885, the dismantled Statue of Liberty, a gift of friendship from the people of France to the people of America, arrives in New York Harbor after being shipped across the Atlantic Ocean in 350 individual pieces packed in more than 200 cases. The copper and iron statue, which was reassembled and dedicated the following year in a ceremony presided over by U.S. President Grover Cleveland, became known around the world as an enduring symbol of freedom and democracy.

The Statue Of Liberty & Liberty Island

1900

Future President Hoover caught in Boxer Rebellion

For nearly a month beginning June 17, 1900, future President Herbert Hoover and his wife Lou are caught in the middle of the Boxer Rebellion in China, when the community of foreigners they lived in, in the city of Tianjin, is besieged and under attack.

1940

France signals intention to surrender to the Nazis

With Paris fallen and the German conquest of France reaching its conclusion, Marshal Henri Petain replaces Paul Reynaud as prime minister and announces his intention to sign an armistice with the Nazis. The next day, French General Charles de Gaulle, not very well known even to the French, made a broadcast to France from England, urging his countrymen to continue the fight against Germany.

French Marshal and Vichy leader Henri-Philippe Petain (1856 - 1951, left) and Nazi leader Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945, right) share the famous 'handshake at Montoire' while interpreter Colonel Schmidt watches, October 1940. Thus Petain announces officially that Vichy-France is prepared to collaborate with the German Reich.

1943

FDR’s secretary of war stifles Truman’s inquiry into suspicious defense plant

On June 17, 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s secretary of war, Henry Stimson, phones then-Missouri Senator Harry S. Truman and politely asks him not to make inquiries about a defense plant in Pasco, Washington.

1953

Soviets crush antigovernment riots in East Berlin

The Soviet Union orders an entire armored division of its troops into East Berlin to crush a rebellion by East German workers and antigovernment protesters. The Soviet assault set a precedent for later interventions into Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968.

1972

Watergate burglars arrested

In the early morning of June 17, 1972, five men are arrested for breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate, an office-hotel-apartment complex in Washington, D.C. In their possession were burglary tools, cameras and film, and three pen-size tear gas guns. At the scene of the crime, and in rooms the men rented at the Watergate, sophisticated electronic bugging equipment was found. Three of the men were Cuban exiles, one was a Cuban American, and the fifth was James W. McCord, Jr., a former CIA agent. That day, the suspects, who said they were “anti-communists,” were charged with felonious burglary and possession of implements of crime.

1976

NBA merges with ABA

On June 17, 1976, the National Basketball Association (NBA) announces a merger with its rival, the American Basketball Association (ABA), and takes on the ABA’s four most successful franchises: the Denver Nuggets, the Indiana Pacers, the New York (later Brooklyn) Nets and the San Antonio Spurs.

2015

Charleston church shooting

On the evening of June 17, 2015, a mass shooter took the lives of nine African American people at a Bible study at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. The massacre at a historic Black church deeply shook a nation already jaded by frequent gun violence and heralded a new chapter of violent white nationalism in America.

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Citation Information

Article title
O.J. Simpson leads L.A. police on a low-speed chase
Website Name
History
Date Accessed
March 23, 2025
Publisher
A&E Television Networks
Last Updated
March 02, 2025
Original Published Date
January 27, 2010

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