Thirteen years ago when O.J. walked out of a Los Angeles courtroom after he was acquitted of a double murder, he had the demeanor of a man who had gotten away with a great crime. Visibly relieved, traces of the smile he once employed as one of corporate America's favorite pitchmen crept tentatively across his face as each "not guilty" verdict was read aloud.

As much of the nation swooned and gnashed its teeth from the injustice of it all, O.J. Simpson swore he would devote himself to finding the person who murdered his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.

He was systematic in his investigation. He moved across the country to Florida where he spent most of his time looking for clues on exclusive golf courses and on the front page of tabloids. He dated women who bore eerie resemblances to his murdered ex-wife. In 1997, he lost a $33.5 million civil suit lodged by the families of the victims, but his NFL pension was untouchable. Meanwhile, he engaged in stunts that exploited his own notoriety.

Eventually, he wrote a book that "re-created" the murder of his wife and her friend and called it fiction. Though his golf game remained mediocre, he made his peace with the moral vacuity that accompanied his stunted celebrity. Anniversaries of the murders didn't seem to bother him. Through it all, his smile remained ineffable. He was content to live out the remainder of his days as the poster child for a toxic brand of American venality and high-spirited banality.

Then in 2007, the once-wily Bugs Bunny of criminal defendants got stupid. While visiting Las Vegas to attend a wedding, the fallen football star and B-movie actor put together a posse of sycophants and hatched a plan to "recover" stolen property from two souvenir dealers specializing in O.J. memorabilia. Guns were brandished and threats shouted in a tiny casino-hotel room. Little did O.J. know that the confrontation was taped and would eventually give a Sin City jury incontrovertible evidence that he wasn't the affable dunce from the "Naked Gun" movies.

His sycophants turned state's evidence. The racially charged theatrics of his murder trial was replaced by a low-energy sequel. This time, there was a shortage of big characters and incompetent prosecutors. In October, 13 years to the day after beating a double murder rap and assuming the mantle of America's Rorschach test, O.J. Simpson was convicted on 12 charges that included kidnapping and armed robbery. Friday was Judgment Day. He was facing life in prison.

There was an air of inevitability as he stood to hear Clark County District Court Judge Jackie Glass pronounce his sentence. Like Wile. E. Coyote grabbing the air beneath his feet before tumbling into a ravine, O.J. tried a previously undreamed of gambit. He expressed contrition.

"I just wanted my personal things," he said. "I was stupid. I'm sorry. I didn't know I was doing anything illegal. I thought I was confronting friends. I thought I was retrieving my things. I didn't mean to hurt anybody and I didn't mean to steal anything."

If the dealers had defied a loaded gun pointing in their faces, O.J. insisted it was always his intention to go to the police with his tale of woe. Judge Glass reminded the defendant that the jury heard the entire confrontation on tape and that it wasn't as benign and uneventful as he presented it. She sentenced him to at least 15 years. He has to serve nine before he can be considered for parole. He could serve as much as 30 years. The court gave itself a lot of latitude.

"Obviously he's upset by the prospect of facing nine years in prison, but I think he's really relieved he didn't get a life sentence," said lawyer Yale Galanter, the only man in America who is arguably more oblivious than O.J. Simpson. At 61, the Pro Football Hall of Famer is guaranteed to do hard time for nearly a decade. The late Johnnie Cochran would have understood immediately that his client had a good chance of drawing his last breath behind bars.

There's a part of me that wants to believe that like Raskolnikov in "Crime and Punishment," O.J. Simpson felt an inner compulsion to repent of his great crime. His caper in Las Vegas didn't rise to the level of a double homicide, but it was as clear a revelation of his criminal heart as he is capable of without actually confessing to the murders. It was such a monumentally self-defeating act, that one hesitates to ascribe it solely to arrogance and stupidity.

The judge insisted that neither she nor the jury were engaged in karmic payback for another jury's decision 13 years ago, but nobody believes that. Strictly speaking, O.J. Simpson didn't get justice in Las Vegas, but there's little doubt he got what he deserved.