The controversial former Los Angeles Police detective Mark Fuhrman has died at the age of 74.
Fuhrman, whose name made headlines as one of the officials investigating the murders of O.J. Simpson’s ex-wife, Nicole Brown, and her friend Ron Goldman in 1994, died on May 12, according to TMZ, which first reported the news.
“Sources tell TMZ … Mark died from an aggressive form of throat cancer, which he was diagnosed with last year. Mark had been hospitalized for about a week before he died. He had done some cancer treatment … but made the final decision to stop. There won’t be a funeral,” the outlet reported on Monday.
Detective Mark Fuhrman passed away today at 74.
Considered to be one of the finest Detectives the LAPD ever produced, famously making the case against OJ Simpson.
One of the first police officers to be smeared by the racist industrial complex, he was forced to retire and… pic.twitter.com/llOC2AjYon
— john jackson (@pvtjokerus) May 18, 2026
Lynette Acebedo, the chief deputy coroner in Kootenai County, Idaho, confirmed Fuhrman’s death on Monday.
“There will be no other information provided through this office,” Acebedo said in a statement, according to NBC News.
According to People:
During Simpson’s 1995 murder trial, Fuhrman testified about evidence in the case, including the bloody glove discovered at Simpson’s Rockingham estate. Prosecutors argued the glove was a match to one found at the Brentwood murder scene, and DNA testing showed it contained the victims’ blood.
Simpson’s defense team challenged Fuhrman’s credibility during the trial and suggested that evidence had been planted, an allegation Fuhrman denied. The defense later presented recordings of Fuhrman using racist language after he had testified that he had not used anti-Black racial slurs in the previous decade, NBC Los Angeles reported.
“There was never a shred, never a hint, never a possibility, not a remote, not a million-, not a billion-to-one possibility I could have planted anything,” Fuhrman told ABC-TV back in 1996. “Nor would I have a reason to.”
He later retired from the LAPD before Simpson was acquitted in October 1995, and pleaded no contest in 1996 to a felony count of perjury related to the trial. He went on to write true crime books, including “Murder in Brentwood,” and made appearances as a commentator on various television and radio shows.
Ron Goldman’s father reacted to the news of the former LAPD detective’s death, telling TMZ: “Anytime anyone dies, it’s a shame.”
He and Tanya Brown, Nicole’s sister, told TMZ “they don’t blame or fault Mark for O.J.’s acquittal.”
“I think Mark’s legacy should not be based around our trial. He did good outside of the trial, and we all make mistakes,” Brown told the outlet. “I don’t wish death upon anyone, and I think he did a lot of good in his life, and people need to focus on the good he did.”
“Anytime someone passes from our case, it’s hard,” she added.
