UPDATE: Thousands watched the ABC 20/20 report on O.J. Simpson’s upcoming parole hearing. The network shared extra bits of an interview with 13 Action News that did not make the broadcast.
"In the 20 years I have worked at the Lovelock Correctional Center, he has got to be the happiest guy, the most positive inmate I have ever met," Jeffery Felix said.
Felix is a retired guard who became friends O.J. Simpson while the former NFL star was behind bars at the Lovelock Correctional Center for the botched 2007 robbery at the Palace Station.
Simpson saying he was trying to get personal memorabilia back.
Felix says behind bars, Simpson is a leader
Heading up the prison softball league and exercising to make sure he is able to walk out of prison if he is granted parole.
“He's got his own entourage of people he hangs out with. Officers say 'good morning to him." Everyone talks to O.J. and O.J. talks to everybody," Felix said.
The retired guard says there is no question, Simpson gets special treatment.
"He'll go to the front of the clinic line, the front of the canteen line, the front of the culinary line. Everybody knows this," Felix said.
But one area Simpson is not getting his way is coverage of his upcoming parole hearing. Felix saying Simpson would prefer a low key process like he had four years ago when he earned partial parole.
Felix saying Simpson feels the added attention could influence the decision of the six members of the parole board who will decide if he walks out of prison this year.
"O.J. isn't happy about it. He thinks any kind of media coverage could be damaging to his parole hearing," Felix said.
Simpson is expected to address that parole board on Thursday in hopes they will approve his release later in the year.
RELATED: Photo gallery of O.J. Simpson through the years
ORIGINAL STORY: With a parole hearing for O.J. Simpson scheduled for next week, ABC's 20/20 tracked down some of those involved in the Las Vegas armed robbery attempt.
Dozens of media agencies from all over the country are expected to converge on Carson City, Nevada, next Thursday as a parole board will decide if Simpson has served enough time.
Simpson is asking to be set free after nearly a decade behind bars.
20/20 is digging deeper into what happened inside that room at the Palace Station when Simpson went to "retrieve" memorabilia.
Reporter Deborah Roberts spoke with several of Simpson's friends who feel he was overcharged and over-sentenced because people felt he got away with the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown, and Ron Goldman.
Simpson was acquitted in that case.
Roberts says many of the people she spoke with, including a retired prison guard, say Simpson has been a leader behind bars and should be paroled.
Those involved with the 2007 robbery attempt say Simpson didn't seem to think he would face this type of punishment.
"I looked at OJ and I said 'what if they call the police' and he looked at me and used a four-letter-word that starts with f and ends with k the police. 'What are they going to do, take me to jail for taking my own stuff," Walter Alexander said.
If Simpson's parole is approved, he could be free as early as October.
If it is denied, Simpson would have to wait another four years to apply for parole again.
13 Action News Anchor Todd Quinones talked with Roberts ahead of the special. Watch the interview below.
