ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — OJ Simpson’s youngest daughter has apparently run out of juice.
Sydney Simpson seems to have fallen far from the lap of luxury – and landed in a cramped condo in a decidedly unflashy pocket of suburban Florida, The Post has learned.
New photos offer a rare glimpse into her quiet, pared-down life in St. Petersburg, where the 40-year-old lives in a ground-floor, 955-square-foot unit – worlds away from the sprawling Los Angeles mansion her family called home before her mother, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Nicole’s pal Ronald Goldman were found brutally murdered outside June 13, 1994.
Sydney, just 8 years old at the time, was reportedly asleep in one of the 3,400-square-foot Brentwood home’s four bedrooms while her mother and Goldman were stabbed to death in the courtyard. Sydney’s NFL Hall of Fame father would later be acquitted of the murders in a famous so-called “trial of the century.”
Nearly three decades later, Sydney is residing in a one-story, two-bedroom abode that sits in a squat building shared with three other units. It is just one of the 27 aging, white-stucco-and-beige structures that make up Casablanca Condominiums, a sleepy complex wedged between the area’s busy, four-lane 54th Avenue South and a weathered golf course.
Sydney purchased the modest dwelling for $135,000 in cash in December 2020, property records show. The unit is now estimated to be worth nearly $216,000 – roughly $125,000 below St. Petersburg’s current median home value of about $340,000.
Her neighborhood – which locals refer to as “South Side of St. Pete” – is rough compared to the rest of the peninsula, residents told The Post.
“Between 54th [Ave S] and Downtown [St. Petersburg], the city puts no money into that area at all. …Those people have been living the same way forever – there’s no good housing and none of the affordable housing is decent,” said masonry contractor Peter Gaunt, 75, who has lived in the area for 50 years.
“It’s lower-income, they’re poor. They’re on Medicare, Medicaid, you know, SNAP [benefits] if they can get them. There’s no job opportunities – there’s nothing in that section of town. Then you get into Downtown and head north, and that’s where the money is,” he said.
A 30-year-old consultant who only gave the name Austin said “there’s a perception” of danger in the nabe.
“Historically, South St. Pete is not the absolute safest, but it’s slowly but surely gentrifying,” Austin said from a grocery store parking lot one mile west of Sydney’s place. “I think there’s comparatively more crime and legal infractions here compared to the north side of St. Pete, but I’ve never had any issues.”
Two vehicles belonging to Sydney’s neighbors were burglarized overnight Nov. 7, according to police reports obtained by the Post.
The criminal, who had yet to be arrested by this month, stole $20 in cash and a $10 Starbucks gift card from one car’s glove box and $40 in cash from the glove box of the second vehicle.
Both cars had been locked and parked just a few spots away from where Sydney regularly parks her white Hyundai Palisade in the complex’s communal lot, the police reports show.
Over the past two weeks, The Post observed an unidentified man and two small children – a boy and a girl – frequently coming and going from Sydney’s home. While their relationship remains unclear, she was often seen keeping watch as the boy, sporting a Spider-Man helmet, pedaled a green bicycle around.
Behind a row of trimmed hedges, the bike, a large brown deck box, an abandoned clay flower pot and a floral outdoor mat cluttered the area leading up to her front door.
Sydney was also spotted dropping the children off at a nearby daycare one morning. Her other errands included stops at the local post office, CVS and repeated visits to two nearby, rundown apartment complexes.
Curiously, on two occasions recently, she spent much of the day – roughly six hours at a time – at a four-bedroom, 3,300-plus-square-foot home in the upscale Allendale neighborhood of the peninsula.
Property records show the impressive Spanish-style home belongs to a family member of ex-St. Petersburg City Councilman Robert Blackmon, whom Sydney was reported to be dating in 2017. A couple who identified themselves as members of the Blackmon family declined to comment when approached by The Post.
Although Sydney has reportedly worked as a real-estate agent in the past, it’s unclear if she’s currently employed or how she supports herself.
As with her late father — whose televised white Bronco chase involving cops after the murders transfixed the nation — Sydney appears to have struggled behind the wheel. She logged seven traffic infractions since 2014 in Pinellas County for alleged speeding, driving with a suspended license and without insurance and having an expired car registration, records show.
While her dad was infamously acquitted of the slayings of his 35-year-old ex-wife and Goldman, 25, at criminal trial, their families sued him, and in 1997, OJ was found liable for $33.5 million in civil judgements for the deaths. That figure ballooned with interest to more than $100 million by the time he died of cancer at age 76 on April 11, 2024.
The former star Buffalo Bills running back also never settled more than $5 million debt he owed in unpaid state and federal tax liens – further complicating his already tangled finances.
It remains unclear whether Sydney or her brother Justin – OJ’s second child from his eight-year marriage to Nicole – received any money from their father’s estate.
Sydney was last photographed publicly with her father in St. Petersburg around Thanksgiving 2018.
OJ, who served nine years in prison for a 2007 armed robbery in Las Vegas, never admitted responsibility for the killings.
Sydney has never spoken publicly about her family’s troubled history. She declined to comment when recently approached by The Post.
Read the full article here
