LAS VEGAS — An alleged victim in the O.J. Simpson kidnapping and armed robbery case testified at a preliminary hearing Thursday that the football great and his associates burst into a casino hotel room in "military-invasion fashion" to steal $100,000 in sports memorabilia at gunpoint.

But another witness said Simpson was just leading a mission to recover precious family heirlooms stolen by unscrupulous memorabilia dealers and an overeager acquaintance waved a gun only after the items were being returned.

The two versions of the events inside Room 1203 of the Palace Station hotel the evening of Sept. 13 occupied the first day of testimony at the preliminary hearing, in which prosecutors are attempting to demonstrate they have enough evidence for the case to proceed to trial.

Simpson and two other men involved in the incident are charged with 11 felonies, including kidnapping, armed robbery, conspiracy and assault with a deadly weapon. They face potential life sentences if convicted.

Both witnesses who testified before a packed courtroom Thursday did so on behalf of the prosecution, but their accounts of what happened were very different.

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Bruce Fromong, a memorabilia dealer who had come to the hotel room under the impression he and a colleague would be peddling signed footballs and other items to a wealthy buyer, asserted that Simpson was at the end of a single-file line of men, two armed with semiautomatic weapons, who barged in barking orders and accusations.(VIDEO)

Fromong, who noted his 20-year career in the Navy, said the men seemed to be carrying out a military maneuver as they rushed into the room, formed "a square" with Simpson at the center and began seizing his property.

"Don't let anybody out of this room. Nobody leaves," the witness quoted Simpson as shouting.

But the second man, auction house owner Thomas Riccio, said the incident occurred only after a number of law enforcement agencies declined to help Simpson get back stolen items, which included game balls and a photo signed by J. Edgar Hoover. (VIDEO)

He said the stunned dealers were handing over the property to Simpson when one of the half-dozen men accompanying him, Michael McClinton, pulled a weapon and began pointing it at them.

"Were you expecting the gun?" a prosecutor asked Riccio, who had helped Simpson arrange what he said was a sting operation to retrieve the items.

"No, heck, no," he replied, adding, "They were giving the stuff back to him without any gun."

Simpson, 60, contends that he saw no guns in the room. The other defendants, Clarence Stewart and Charles Ehrlich, also maintain their innocence.

A lawyer for Simpson attempted to portray Fromong as a shady hawker of stolen merchandise. He noted that, in a television interview after the incident, Fromong claimed he would have given Simpson the memorabilia for free if he had only asked for it.

"Isn't that because you knew these items were stolen from O.J. and he was there to get back his stuff?" defense attorney Gabriel Grasso asked.

No, Fromong said, insisting, "I have paid for each and every item or I have traded for them."

Sports memorabilia dealer Bruce Fromong said O.J. Simpson and others appeared to be carrying out a military manuever.

Fromong admitted that he tried to capitalize on the incident to make money, calling the television tabloid show "Inside Edition" before even phoning 911 and considering a book deal.

"I'm a businessman," he said with a shrug of his shoulders.

Using the Web browser on his phone, Grasso confronted him with eBay listings in which Fromong is currently auctioning Simpson memorabilia.

"Identical to the one O.J. stole from me," Grasso read.

Fromong denied he had profited from the alleged theft.

"The prices haven't increased," he said.

Simpson, dressed in a charcoal suit, rolled his eyes repeatedly as Fromong testified. The men had once been friends and associates in a sports memorabilia business. Fromong, who consistently referred to the defendant as "O.J.," said that, although he and Simpson had not seen each other for a few years before the incident, they had once been close enough that Simpson had phoned his mother on her birthday to sing to her.

Riccio testified that the other dealer in the room, middleman Alfred Beardsley, called him a month and a half before the alleged robbery, bragging about a trove of "far-out" personal property stolen from Simpson.

He said that he contacted local and federal authorities, but they told him it was as civil matter.

He said he called Simpson, who said that many items, including family photos, had been stolen from him.

"O.J. made it clear to me he wanted to recover it for his family, that he didn't want to sell it," Riccio said.

He said Simpson began organizing an operation even though his attorney and his sister had warned him that to do so would be "crazy."

"O.J. was mainly the one plotting this out. He was the one who made the decisions," Riccio said.

O.J. Simpson could face life in prison if he is convicted of the charges against him.

The issue of whether Simpson knew — and perhaps even instructed — McClinton and another man to bring guns is a central issue in the case. The two armed men struck plea agreements with prosecutors and are expected to testify along with a third man who says he saw the weapons.

Fromong testified that McClinton trained the weapon on him while Simpson stormed around the room. Prosecutors played an audiotape Riccio made of the meeting in which a voice can be heard saying "bang bang" among a din of shouted profanities.

Riccio said that while police were interviewing him shortly after the incident, Simpson called him and left a message on his phone.

When Riccio called him back while police were still there, he said, Simpson asked if he had told them that there were guns present and he said he had.

Simpson then asked him to put the police on the phone, Riccio said, and the former football star told the officers that "the whole thing was a misunderstanding."

Riccio will be cross-examined by defense attorneys Friday.

Judge Joe Bonaventure of the Clark County Justice Court slated two days for the hearing, but it appeared the proceeding would stretch longer to accommodate eight witnesses the prosecution plans to call in their bid to establish probable cause, the standard of proof necessary for the defendants to go to trial.