Porn Valley- I’ve read a bunch of books on the O.J. murder trial but don’t believe I’ve come across any references to Devon Shire, the porn star from the early Nineties.

In putting together my notes for an upcoming book about the industry, I came across this gossip item from 14 years ago, and present it now if only for some interesting speculation and hindsight.

According to Devon Shire, who apparently shared pillows with O.J. buddy Al Cowlings, O.J. supposedly confessed to the killings of his wife, Nicole, and Ronald Goldman.

Just recently you’ll recall, da O.J. wrote his own book pretty much admitting same but with a brilliant dance of circumspection and conditional phraseology thrown between the covers.

The tabloids, to be sure, picked up on the Devon Shire story at the time but where it went from there was pretty much the proverbial cul de sac since Simpson was acquitted. During her run of the bulls, Devon Shire was referred to by her real name, Jennifer Peace.

Her involvement with Cowlings, by way of the bedsheets, got Peace some ink in the Star and certainly a ringside seat in front of a grand jury. [Peace did an interview in the February 1995 Cheri Magazine about her relationship with Cowlings.]

Cowlings, for anyone who was around the business at that time, was a hanger-on to the industry and attended events like Night of the Stars. So it would seem logical that he’d have made the acquaintances of porn performers since Cowlings had also been seen in the company with the likes of Lacy Rose and Porsche Lynn.

Cowling’s attorneys, however, claim Peace was a one-time deal with him; Peace’s attorney, on the other hand, says it was a relationship.

Nevertheless, Peace told the Grand Jury what Cowlings was supposed to have told her: That OJ did it.

With Cowlings’ phone records and a subpoena in tow, Peace proceeded to tell her story. She supposedly told the Grand Jury how she received a call from Cowlings during the famous Ford Bronco chase that Cowlings said “OJ did it.”

According to Peace, Cowlings, himself, allegedly admitted to having stalked Goldman- only days before the slayings- to Nicole Simpson’s bedroom window. If that conversation did indeed take place from the Bronco, that’s a far different from the story Cowlings later tells about having had a gun to his head.

Cowlings is also supposed to have told Peace that the Bronco ride was an escape attempt. A Time magazine article further quoted Peace as claiming Cowlings said, “The murder weapon sleeps with the fishes.”

Peace later told the Star how Cowlings also allegedly said, “Trust me, they’ll never find it. It’s in the water somewhere.”

Peace also denied the quote attributed to her in Time. But she’s also been quoted as saying how Cowlings and Simpson “weren’t going to no gravesite…but then they saw 40 cops and 15 choppers, and they said, ‘hmmm, maybe escaping isn’t such a good idea.’”

The LA Times also reported Peace as having told the Grand Jury how Cowlings said to her the bloody gloves found at the scene of the killings were Cowlings’, that Simpson gave him the bloody knife to dispose of, and that he and Simpson were hoping to flee to Mexico.

Peace also suggested to Time magazine that Simpson stalked Goldman the Friday before the killings. Peace also said that Cowlings told her Simpson didn’t go to his ex-wife’s townhouse to kill her.

“He [OJ] had the knife on him, and he got so angry, he went into a rage and almost blacked out over what happened,” Peace continued. She also told Time that from her knowledge, “O.J. hated Goldman with a passion.”

Besides the tabs, Peace’s comments fueled an equal time frenzy among TV shows like Hard Copy and Inside Edition. Springing to action, LAPD got a search warrant of Peace’s two-bedroom West Hollywood condo. They looked for audio tape recordings, answering machine tapes, message center logs, handwritten notes, typed notes, memorandums, letters, documents, computer files and discs pertaining to conversations with Cowlings and anything pertaining to Cowlings and Simpson.

Peace’s apartment was searched, videotaped and another Grand Jury subpoena for the murder trial was then served on her. Singing now a different tune, Peace went before the Grand Jury, again, this time declining to have any pertinent knowledge about the knife disposal and the O.J. did it quotes.

She was satisfied to call it case closed, but Peace, at the same time, enjoying the limelight, seemed bent on leaking more pieces of information to the press.

Supposedly on the eve of her Grand Jury appearance, Peace is reported to have interviewed with the Star with quotes that would further draw Cowlings into the muck and mire of the O.J. investigation. This time she quoted Cowlings quoting O.J. as saying: “I’ve done something terrible. I didn’t mean to do it. I didn’t mean for things to turn out this way.”

The Star goes on to say that Cowlings and Peace had a “tryst several days before the murders” at which time Peace claims Cowlings said: “I’m worried about O.J. He’s been really distracted lately and keeps flying into rages about Nicole. He’s not himself. I’m afraid of what he’s capable.”

According to the Star article, Cowlings and Peace apparently got together again eight days after the murders, less than two miles from the crime scene, with Peace claiming how Cowlings described O.J. as babbling about doing something awful and that “Nicole shouldn’t have been killed that way.”

At the time, one of Simpson’s defense attorneys Robert Shapiro, reportedly, was digging up dirt on Peace in an effort to discredit her. Which wouldn’t have been too difficult, all things considered. [Personally I thought Peace was a nutcase.]

Peace’s love affair with the tabloids would certainly have gone a long way to label her a flake and a profiteer as well. Peace was even claiming that Hard Copy had offered her $50,000 but whether they actually came up with the dough isn’t known.

That Peace was an armpiece to the stars is hardly newsworthy. She boasted of affairs with musician Vince Neil, director Adam Rifkin, now retired ballplayers Cecil Fielder and Barry Bonds [I met Bonds at an XRCO awards show years ago]; and Sylvester Stallone.

According to a book written by John Bloom about Bonds, Peace, in 1994 in a suit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, named Bonds in a paternity suit, claiming she had a kid by him.

At the time these stories broke, Debi Diamond was quoted as saying, “Jennifer’s smearing a lot of our friends, such as Al [Cowlings], O.J., Marcus [Allen]- most of whom she’s never met.”

According to one performer, Peace, during the Bronco chase, supposedly yelled to people in the room with her, “I bet Al’s gonna be calling me.”

Later, Peace would remark that her popularity quotient rose in the industry once her celebrity connections got more out there.

“Suddenly I get calls from producers who want to hire me,” she said, noting that her attorney advised her to not so much as “flash a tit until this mess is over with.”

Now, years later, Devon Shire is hardly a blip on the Google radar screen.