By Dan Whitcomb

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - Former football star O.J. Simpson, acquitted in a sensational double murder trial in 1995, was being held in jail without bail on Monday, accused of armed theft of his own sports souvenirs from memorabilia dealers in a Las Vegas hotel room.

Simpson was arrested on Sunday on suspicion of armed robbery, assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy and burglary. An expletive-laden audiotape surfaced on Monday in which an angry Simpson was apparently heard making threats.

The football-player-turned-actor was denied bail because he was considered a possible flight risk and had no ties to the local community, Clark County Judge Nancy Oesterle said.

He is due in court on Wednesday and can seek bail then, Oesterle told a throng of reporters outside a Las Vegas courthouse in a scene reminiscent of the murder trial in which the star athlete was found innocent of the 1994 killing of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.

"I guess this is what they call a media frenzy," said Oesterle, who was appointed to handle media issues surrounding the case.

Chief Las Vegas prosecutor David Roger said his office would file a criminal complaint against Simpson and his co-defendants in the coming days.

"While this case is certainly attracting more attention from the media than our other cases, we will treat this case with the same professionalism we afford all the cases we prosecute," Roger said.

A court spokesman said Simpson would likely be taken from the jail to the courthouse in an underground tunnel for the hearing and special arrangements were being made to accommodate the dozens of reporters seeking to attend.

THIRD SUSPECT ARRESTED

Police have not accused Simpson of brandishing a firearm in the confrontation but he could still be convicted of participating in an armed robbery if one or more of the men said to have been with him was threatening dealers wit a gun.

Late on Monday, court officials said a third suspect had been arrested.

Clarence Stewart, 53, turned himself into police and by the end of the day had been released on $78,000 bail, court spokesman Michael Sommermeyer said.

Walter Alexander, a 46-year-old resident of Arizona, was arrested on Sunday. Police were still searching for three other suspects.

An audiotape of the incident, reportedly made by one of the dealers, was released by the celebrity Web site TMZ.com. In the recording, a man said to be Simpson is heard saying: "Don't let nobody out of this room ... Think you can steal my shit and sell it?"

Simpson has told reporters he did nothing wrong and was merely trying to retrieve his own collectibles, personal photos, his Hall of Fame certificate and other items he said had been stolen by a former sports agent.

A second sports collector, Bruce Fromong, who was in the hotel room during the incident, told ABC's "Good Morning America" that Simpson never held a gun.

"The door burst open, and in came, running in, almost commando-style, O.J. Simpson and some of his people, with guns drawn," Fromong said. "And O.J. at that time was saying, 'I want my stuff. I want my stuff'."

"The thing in my mind as soon as I saw him, I'm thinking, 'O.J., how can you be this dumb?'," Fromong said. "He didn't need to be there."

Simpson was a record-setting running back in the National Football League nicknamed "The Juice" who parlayed that fame into a career in movies and television.

After he was acquitted of murder in a criminal court in 1995, a civil court jury found Simpson responsible for the deaths and ordered him to pay $33.5 million in damages to their families.

(Additional reporting by Jill Serjeant in Los Angeles)