|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
By Veronica Mackey
Medical researchers won’t get the chance to determine whether former football player, actor and Hertz pitchman O.J. Simpson suffered from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE).
Malcolm LaVergne, executor to Simpson’s estate said the family gave a “hard no” to clinics requesting his brain be donated to medical research. Simpson passed away last week from prostate cancer and will be cremated.
For years, some in the medical community have suspected that he suffered from the brain disease due to multiple head injuries during his 11-year career as a professional football player.
CTE is known to cause aggressive behavior, memory loss and confusion, but can only be confirmed after a person has passed away, and their brain can be studied after an autopsy. It results from the death of nerve cells and regeneration.
Simpson was acquitted of the 1994 murders of ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman. During his trial, it was revealed publicly that he had a history of domestic violence. Years after his acquittal, he wrote a book titled If I Did It, where he speculated how he might have committed the murders. The memoir raised eyebrows even among some of his supporters.
Noting that Simpson showed many of the classic signs of CTE, renowned researcher, Dr. Bennet Omalu, told ABC News he would bet his medical license on Simpson having the brain disorder.
In 2015, Will Smith portrayed Omalu in the movie “Concussion.”
