Marguerite Whitley is best known publicly as the first wife of O.J. Simpson, though she has spent most of her life deliberately outside the spotlight. Sources differ on some basic details of her early life, which itself says something about how little she has shared publicly over the decades.
Early Life
Public records and biographical databases don’t fully agree on Whitley’s birth details. IMDb lists her birth date as August 27, 1948, in San Francisco, California, while The Movie Database lists March 20, 1949, in Los Angeles. Neither claim is backed by a primary source, and no definitive public record has been widely cited, so both figures should be treated as approximate.
What is consistently reported is that Whitley grew up in California and met O.J. Simpson in high school, before his football career took off. According to Wikipedia, she had been dating a friend of Simpson’s, A.C. Cowlings, when she and Simpson first met.
Marriage to O.J. Simpson
Whitley and Simpson married on June 24, 1967, in San Francisco. He was 19 and a freshman at USC; she was 18. The marriage came the year before Simpson won the Heisman Trophy in 1968, the same year the couple’s first child, daughter Arnelle, was born.
Their son Jason followed in 1970. A third child, daughter Aaren, was born in 1977. In August 1979, Aaren drowned in the family’s swimming pool a few weeks before her second birthday. It’s a loss that biographical sources reference with little additional detail, and it’s not a subject Whitley has discussed publicly at any length.
The marriage ended in divorce in 1979, the same year as Aaren’s death, with the couple citing the pressures of Simpson’s fame. In a 1979 interview with People, Simpson said the demands of public life had strained the relationship, noting his wife’s preference for privacy.
One unresolved and disputed claim appears in the historical record: former LAPD officer Terry Schauer later told journalist Geraldo Rivera, and later the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, that Whitley had once told him Simpson had been physically violent toward her during their marriage. Whitley herself never confirmed this publicly, declined to testify at Simpson’s 1995 murder trial, and told interviewers there had been no violence during their marriage. Because the claim rests on a single secondhand account that Whitley has not corroborated, it remains an allegation rather than an established fact.
Life After the Divorce
Following her divorce from Simpson, Whitley largely withdrew from public attention. Some sources report she remarried at least twice, to Rudolph Lewis in 1986 (reportedly ending in 1991) and to a man named Anthony Thomas around 1992, though these details are thinly sourced and haven’t been independently confirmed through major outlets. She has been described in various biographical write ups as having worked in retail and small business roles.
Despite her connection to one of the most publicly scrutinized figures and legal cases of the twentieth century, Whitley has avoided interviews and media appearances for decades. When Simpson faced trial in 1995 for the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman, Whitley was reportedly among those who spoke in his defense and attended proceedings in support of their children, but she did not seek a public role in the case.
Her son Jason Simpson has spoken occasionally about his father in interviews, including a 2021 appearance on the podcast “The Food That Binds,” where he worked as a chef and culinary director. Whitley herself has not given comparable public interviews in recent years, and her current whereabouts are not publicly documented.
A Note on the Gaps
Much of what’s available about Whitley online is secondhand, drawn from tabloid-adjacent sites, archival photo captions, and passing references in stories about Simpson rather than from Whitley’s own words. Where sources conflict, as with her birth date and birthplace, this piece has noted the discrepancy rather than picking one version to present as settled fact. That gap in the record appears to be by design. Whitley has consistently chosen not to build a public narrative around her life, even during the periods when public interest in her would have been highest.
