The panel of nine women and three men heard closing arguments on Thursday that included an admission from Mr. Simpson’s lawyer that it had been unwise of Mr. Simpson to lead five men into a room at the Palace Station Hotel-Casino in 2007 to retrieve keepsakes he said had been stolen from him.

“I will be the first to tell you, doing this on your own, going into a hotel room to get back your stolen stuff, is not bright,” said Yale Galanter, Mr. Simpson’s lead lawyer. “It’s just not bright. But being stupid and being frustrated is not being a crook.”

District Attorney David Roger of Clark County disagreed, insisting that Mr. Simpson and his group planned and executed an armed robbery and kidnapping when they burst into the room, brandished guns and departed with a trove of items that included memorabilia related to the football career of Mr. Simpson and other athletes.

The items were in the possession of two sports memorabilia dealers, Bruce L. Fromong and Alfred Beardsley.

“In the state of Nevada, we are a civilized community, we don’t want people going into rooms to take property,” Mr. Roger said. “That is robbery. You don’t go in and get a gun and demand property from people.”

The jury has heard three weeks of testimony from two dozen witnesses in the case against Mr. Simpson and his co-defendant, Clarence Stewart, one of the five men who accompanied him to the hotel room. Both face 12 charges. The kidnapping charge could carry a sentence of 15 years to life.

Four of the witnesses who testified were the others who accompanied Mr. Simpson and Mr. Stewart. All of them have accepted plea deals from prosecutors. Two of those men, Walter Alexander and Michael McClinton, carried guns in the incident and one, Mr. McClinton, testified that he did so at Mr. Simpson’s request.

Much of the crucial evidence in this case came from surreptitious audio recordings of the planning and execution of the event by Thomas Riccio, a memorabilia auctioneer who arranged the confrontation. Mr. Riccio had told Mr. Fromong and Mr. Beardsley that he had a buyer for the items but instead brought Mr. Simpson to take the items.

Mr. Roger played audio during his closing remarks in which Mr. Simpson is heard telling his cohorts before the incident that he wanted them to appear menacing and telling them dur ing the event not to allow Mr. Fromong, Mr. Riccio or Mr. Beardsley to leave the 335-square-foot room.

“Six very large people detaining these people in a room with the intent to take property from them, that’s kidnapping,” Mr. Roger said.

Mr. Galanter countered that Mr. Simpson had no knowledge of guns before or during the incident, and sought only to recover items of family memorabilia including ceremonial footballs, plaques and photos of his parents that had been in his home years ago. He reminded the jury that Mr. Riccio, upon learning that the items were in Mr. Beardsley’s possession months before the incident, asked both the F.B.I. and local police in California to help Mr. Simpson recover them. Mr. Riccio said he was turned away by both agencies.

“This isn’t property to him, this is the timeline of his life,” Mr. Galanter said. “That’s why this property raised such high emotion.”