Friday, July 24, 2020 | 2:58 p.m.
Was that a mannequin head?
The road crew working the morning litter patrol pulled their vehicle onto the berm of Interstate 77 near E. 30th Street in Cleveland. It had sure looked like a mannequin head.
One of the workers got out to investigate. He picked up the object. It was a head, all right, but made of bronze. Much too heavy for a mannequin.
And the face was unmistakable.
"Oh, you found O.J.," his crew mate remarked. "Holy [expletive]! It is him," the man replied, turning the head in his hands.
And so was solved, 25 years ago this week, the brief disappearance of O.J. Simpson's missing Pro Football Hall of Fame bust.
The heist
The thief struck on Sunday, July 23, 1995. It wasn't any given Sunday, but Kickoff Sunday, the start of the Hall of Fame Festival, when the football world turned its gaze on Canton.
More than 1,300 visitors packed the Hall of Fame that day, and Simpson's was the most notorious of the 180 busts on display. The former Bills and 49ers running back, enshrined in 1985, was awaiting trial in California for the 1994 murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
After Simpson's arrest, the Hall of Fame put his jersey under glass to protect it, but didn't take steps to safeguard his bust. No one had ever tried to take one of the busts, which had little value outside the museum.
And then it happened.
At a quarter past 5 p.m., three hours before the Hall was set to close, a visitor reported Simpson's 35-pound bust was — gone. All of the busts were fastened to their displays to keep them from tipping over, but a man had worked loose Simpson's, put it in a duffel bag and walked out.
Hall of Fame staff later discovered the thief had escaped through a back door. The door's security system had been turned off for construction a project.
Police released a sketch of the thief. Witnesses described him as a white man in his 20s or 30s with spiked, blond hair. Police also searched for a possible female accomplice.
The Canton-Stark County Crime Lab checked the bust for fingerprints and other evidence. The thief was never found. That mystery remains.
The return
Less than 48 hours after the bust was stolen, Canton police returned it to the Hall of Fame. The bust was still dusty with fingerprinting powder.
"We're relieved to have it back where it should be," said Pete Elliott, the Hall of Fame executive director at the time. "It's been a hectic two days. It's amazing that it was recovered in such a short time."
A crowd of 100 onlookers clapped and chanted "O.J., O.J." while workers reattached the bust to its display with two 6-inch bolts.
It's the same bust on display today, and the only one ever stolen, said Hall of Fame spokesman Rich Desrosiers. "It hasn't happened again and hopefully we're not giving anybody any ideas to try it," he said.
The Hall of Fame tightened security after the theft and all 326 busts are now firmly anchored to their displays.
"Certainly there are more cameras and more alarms than there were 25 years ago," Desrosiers said. And since Sept. 11, 2001, bags have been banned from inside the Hall of Fame.
Simpson beat the murder rap on Oct. 3, 1995, but later lost a wrongful death lawsuit and was ordered to pay $33.5 million in damages to the Brown and Goldman families.
Simpson also lost many mementos from his career, including his 1968 Heisman Trophy, which was auctioned off.
He later served nine years in prison for a 2007 Las Vegas kidnapping and robbery. Simpson said he was only trying to recover sports memorabilia that belonged to him.
His Hall of Fame bust was not among the items. It's still safe in Canton.
