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ONE VERDICT ON O.J. SIMPSON IS INDISPUTABLE. He stands to make a financial killing off his alleged crime. The former Buffalo Bills running back, sports commentator, actor and Hertz spokesman has already earned an estimated $3 million to $4 million from his best-selling book I Want to Tell You (Little Brown, $17.95) and other opportunistic deals since the June 1994 murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman. If acquitted, Simpson could rake in another $6 million or more from book and pay-per-view television deals, for a total take of well over $10 million. Says Dove Books president Michael Viner, who published Fae Resnick's controversial biography Nicole Brown Simpson: The Private Diary of a Life Interrupted: "O.J. is making the best money of his life."

At the height of his pretrial fame, in 1991, Simpson earned nearly $1 million annually as a commentator for NBC Sports and Hertz. Both relationships were terminated soon after the murders, but O.J. was earning big bucks within six months of moving into the L.A. County Men's Central Jail, thanks to a reported $1 million advance for his book, which answered some of the more than 300,000 letters he has received in prison. The hardcover has already sold more than 500,000 copies, earning O.J. another $1 million-plus in royalties.

And writing a book isn't all that's been keeping the celebrity jailbird juiced. Since his arrest, he has signed 2,500 trading cards, for which he earned $200,000 (up from the $20,000 he was set to earn from autographing the cards before the crime). He recorded a message that greets users of a prepaid O.J. phone card; that brought him $100,000. And he okayed the sale of limited-edition 21-inch bronze statues (right) of himself in football gear. His take: $50,000 up front, with the potential to make more than $1 million if all 3,200 statues are sold.

O.J. is also fighting for a piece of the estimated $50 million-plus market in unauthorized O.J. merchandise and services. O.J. Inc., as it were, now includes more than 30 books, such as the best-selling O.J.'s Legal Pad (Villard, $9.95), a humorous look at the trial by Henry Beard and John Boswell, with 360,000 copies in print. Other offerings:

O.J. theme cruises. A three-day Trial of the Century Cruise in September from L.A. to Ensenada, Mexico, with featured guest Allan Park, the limo driver who sped O.J. to the airport the night of the murders, generated more than $30,000 in revenues. A second sailing is scheduled for next month.

Trial videotapes. From Court TV and WarnerVision Entertainment, a four-tape package that sells for $12.95 per tape.

Computer software. The O.J. Juror Software from Litigator Software of Boise, Idaho contains the entire court transcript as well as images and an index to locate key evidence. Price: $49.95 a pop.

Last year O.J. filed a trademark application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that would restrict others from using the names O.J., O.J. Simpson and Juice. If approved, it could bolster a suit Simpson's lawyers filed in August, accusing three dozen apparel and souvenir manufacturers and retailers of interfering with their client's own "profit-making endeavors" by selling "unauthorized and unlicensed merchandise carrying his name, photograph and/or likeness." O.J. wants a minimum of $50,000 from each manufacturer and a minimum of $7,500 from each retailer.

One opportunist O.J. isn't suing: Al Cowlings, his lifelong pal and the driver in the famed Bronco chase, who is also selling his own prepaid phone cards for $10 each. As a bonus, A.C. agreed to sign them in front of a white Bronco at a trade show. He also has a $2.99-a-minute "Ask A.C." 900 phone line that earned $300,000 the first month it was hooked up in February 1995.

If convicted, O.J. may have to halt his efforts to cash in on his notoriety, since California is one of 36 states that bar convicted criminals from profiting from their crimes. (He could still earn money from ventures connected to his previous fame.) Moreover, most of what O.J. has made so far has gone to pay the estimated $100,000-a-week Dream Team legal bills that are rapidly depleting his pretrial fortune, a reported $10 million.

Should he not be convicted, however, O.J. is poised to set some off-the-field records for postscandal profits. Dove Books' Viner says a $4 million advance for O.J.'s second book would not be surprising. Another possibility: a pay-per-view interview, although Leroy "Skip" Taft, O.J.'s business attorney, denies rumors that his client's representatives have been negotiating with Larry King to do a pay-per-view special after the trial. "I had dinner with Larry King, an old friend, and everybody just went crazy with speculation," Taft told MONEY.

But cable industry sources insist that some type of pay-per-view deal is a strong possibility for a freed O.J.--and potentially very profitable for him. Conservatively assuming an audience of 500,000 viewers at $14.95 each (vs. the all-time high of 1.4 million homes that shelled out $37.95 each to see George Foreman fight Evander Holyfield in 1991), O.J. could earn more than $2 million from such a special.

But who's to say that O.J. wouldn't grab a better television offer? Says Ross Levinsohn, director of production and marketing enterprises for Home Box Office: "I think O.J. could probably get more than $2 million from a show like Hard Copy." Clearly, for O.J., crime accusations can pay--big-time.

Reporter associate: Laura Mecoy