Santa Rosa woman who testified in O.J. Simpson trial reacts to his parole

For a Santa Rosa woman who testified in the O.J. Simpson murder trial, the news that the former football star, actor and ad pitchman is being paroled has brought up memories of a sorrowful and surreal time of personal loss and what she sees as a larger travesty of justice that played out on the national level.

Tia Gavin was a college student working as a waitress with Ron Goldman, who was slain along with Simpson’s ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson on the night of June 12, 1994.

Gavin waited on Nicole, her parents, friends and their children at the Mezzaluna Restaurant and her testimony was sought by the prosecution to establish a timeline leading up to the knife attack that killed Goldman and Nicole Simpson later that night.

On Friday, Gavin said she was not surprised that Simpson was granted parole after nine years in prison, but she finds it depressing that he will go free.

“Unfortunately, he was in prison for robbery and was never going to be in there for a particularly long period of time on that charge,” she said.

Simpson was convicted for a bungled attempt to get back some of his trophies and sports memorabilia that he considered stolen from him. He was arrested and tried on murder charges in the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Goldman, but in a controversial jury decision, he was acquitted.

He later was found civilly responsible for the killings and ordered to pay millions of dollars to the Goldman family and other survivors.

Gavin worries that the charming side of Simpson’s “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” personality could rehabilitate his image, which was shattered after he was charged with the killings. His so-called “Trial of the Century” with a “dream team” of lawyers was watched by tens of millions of people on television.

“Sometimes people who are blacklisted come back in vogue,” she said.

For a long time following the trial, Gavin shied away from discussing it, or her memory of co-worker Ron Goldman, then 25.

“For years after, it felt pretty tacky to talk to the press about it,” she said Friday. “It was someone we knew who passed away and there was such a macabre interest in it.”

But as the years went by and it became less visceral, it’s become easier to revisit, she said Friday.

Gavin, who works as a wedding photographer, was finishing her bachelor’s degree in sociology at the University of California Los Angeles at the time of the killings.

Goldman, she said, was “a typical, young, athletic-looking man, attractive, perfectly nice and an aspiring actor.”

Gavin had waited tables along with Goldman for about eight months at the Italian restaurant in Brentwood.

She said she waited on Nicole Simpson and her party at Goldman’s request.

“He considered her a friend. He had seen her socially a few times,” she said, adding that some waiters prefer not to wait on people they know.

Gavin said she’s been asked if Goldman and Simpson were having an affair. “I have no idea. Probably like any hot-blooded young man, he would have liked to have something going on with her,” she said. “She was a beautiful woman. I suspect it was not at that stage if it was ever going to be.”

It was after Nicole Simpson and her party left the restaurant that someone noticed some reading glasses had been left behind.

“Ron interjected he’d be happy to return them,” Gavin said.

Shortly thereafter, Goldman was killed in a savage knife attack along with Nicole Simpson outside her nearby home.

Gavin said it was intimidating to testify at Simpson’s trial, with the defendant sitting at a table facing her and the nation’s attention riveted on the proceedings.

Everything from the bottle of wine ordered to the amount of the tip, the food the Nicole Simpson party had, and the waiter’s time punch clocks were subject to cross-examination.

“They were also asking me about the mood and demeanor of Nicole and their guests - what they ate and double verifying it against her stomach contents,” Gavin said. “It was a pretty intense double murder, not just your mistaken crime of passion.”

She said in retrospect she believes social and cultural components contributed to a failure of the justice system.

Simpson looks like a pathetic person to her now.

“He was this great, beloved public figure who is now despised. His fortune’s lost,” she said, adding that she hopes he won’t profit from his fame.

And seeing him get parole, she said “brings up the ancient past to a very sad and messed up time.”

“I hope he has a lousy life,” she said.

You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 707-521-5214 or clark.mason@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter@clarkmas.