O.J.'s girlfriend determined to stand by him

Christie Prody has been with Simpson through it all for more than a decade.

MIAMI - In her 1993 high school yearbook, Christie Prody wrote that her plans included "moving somewhere tropical" and buying a luxury car. She's living at least part of her dream as O.J. Simpson's longtime girlfriend.

That's not to say it has all come up roses for Prody, 32, and the 60-year-old former football star. Police have occasionally been called to domestic spats between the two. She has also been arrested for misdemeanor marijuana possession and for animal cruelty, after a cat left alone in her apartment starved to death.

But the blond who grew up outside Minneapolis hoping to become a psychiatrist has stuck it out with Simpson for more than a decade. She showed up in court in Las Vegas last week when he appeared on charges of robbery, kidnapping and other offenses stemming from a hotel room confrontation with sports memorabilia collectors.

Prody has been seen recently coming and going from the four-bedroom, four-bath, $1.1-million home Simpson bought in 2000.

"People need to know he hasn't done anything wrong," Prody told reporters and photographers as she pulled up to the house in a modest Mitsubishi sports car.

Prody, who bears some resemblance to Simpson's slain ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, had bigger plans when she graduated from high school in St. Anthony Village, Minn. In the school yearbook, Prody wrote that she hoped to "get my Ph.D. in psychiatry, move somewhere tropical and buy a Mercedes."

She attended the University of Minnesota from 1993 to 1995 but didn't graduate, according to school records. She moved in 1996 to Los Angeles and worked at least some of the time as a waitress.

That was after Simpson was acquitted in the bloody 1994 knife slayings of his ex-wife and her friend Ron Goldman. It's not clear how they met in Los Angeles, but Prody's mother has said in past media interviews that her daughter wanted to meet Simpson and occasionally went by his house.

Once Simpson and Prody were together in Miami, they started getting attention - not all of it positive.

In 1999, Simpson called police from Prody's townhouse to say that she had been on a cocaine binge. Then, in 2000, police said Simpson told them Prody had kicked and slapped him at a Miami hotel.

There was another physical confrontation between the couple in 2001, and another spat involving a neighbor in 2005.

No charges were filed in those incidents.

[Last modified September 28, 2007, 23:38:41]