OJ Simpson, America’s most notorious sports star who was cleared of murdering his wife, was today the focus of renewed controversy after being implicated in a burglary at a Las Vegas casino.

The former football star was taken in for questioning by Las Vegas police in connection with a hold-up at the city’s Palace Station casino sometime yesterday, according to US media reports.

Simpson was accused of breaking into a hotel room at the casino, NBC reported. The police confirmed that they were questioning him and four others in connection with the theft, which “involved sports memorabilia.” He was not arrested.

Footage of Simpson entering the police station for interview was broadcast on US television, less than 24 hours after the launch of his book discussing how he might have killed his wife, under the title If I Did It.

A swarm of photographers clamoured to get a shot of the troubled star as he left the police station, the scene a throwback to the media hysteria surrounding his 1994 trial. He was released while the investigation continued, though was understood to have remained in Las Vegas.

Simpson shot to worldwide infamy when tried for the murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman, who were found stabbed to death outside Nicole's LA condominium.

The pair had separated five years earlier after Simpson pleaded no contest to a domestic violence charge. Following the discovery of their bodies, Simpson was questioned but before being arrested went on the run in his white Ford Bronco, leading police on a 60 mile pursuit from Orange County to his Rockingham Home.

On his return home, he was arrested and charged. The televised trial, which ended in his highly controversial acquittal, captivated Americans and audiences around the globe.

In 1997 Simpson was found liable for the deaths by a civil court, but has yet paid little of the $33.5 million judgment.

The 60-year-old has not been afraid to play up to the mystery surrounding his role in the killings. His book If I Did It, long delayed due to legal wrangling, purports to be a fictional first-person account of the murders if he had committed them, while he has on several occasions made highly ambiguous statements regarding his culpability in the US media.

Though 90 per cent of the rights to the book have been awarded to Brown and Goldman’s families, the timing of his questioning, the same day as If I Did It hits bookstores across the US, will no doubt cause more cynical observers to suspect a publicity stunt.

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