Live! The Michael Jackson Trial Blog

Jury sees books featuring naked boys, reporter ruled out as witness

'US Weekly' reporter won't tell of
Neverland "escape," but prosecutors
bank on nude photos as pattern evidence

Prosecutors displayed the covers of two books featuring photographs of dressed and undressed boys. Prosecutor Ron Zonen said the photographs of boys in one book were about 90% nude and in the other about 10%.

“Boys Will Be Boys!” and “The Boy: A Photographic Essay” had been seized in a locked filing cabinet inside a locked closet in Michael Jackson’s bedroom suite at Neverland during allegations of molestation launched in 1993.

The books were admitted as 1108 prior acts evidence. Surprisingly, the photos inside were not shown on the courtroom’s big-screen projector — the theater treatment Tom Sneddon gave Jackson’s hardcore heterosexual porn. Will the jury ultimately see these books as art, or as evidence of pedophilia?

Legal analyst Anne Bremner tells me these books will be a kind of evintiary time bomb — one of the first things jurors will want to examine close-up when they retire to deliberate this case.

The books are not kiddie porn. No touching, no sex acts are depicted. Until now only adult pornography has been seen in the physical evidence against Jackson. With the admission of these two books, the sexual allegations how carry a new and different weight.

Seems like the prosecution wanted to get back to its core case: the child molestation charges, now that the conspiracy seems increasingly groundess (unless record producer Rudy Provencio links Jackson directly to the antics of Mark Schaffel and Frank Tyson with audio tapes he is said to have) and after having been sucker-punched by Debbie Rowe.

Images of naked children in this trial are disturbing at best, damning at worst — truly hot-button evidence. The jury was removed as admission of this these books was debated. Once back inside the courtroom...

Los Angeles Police Detective Rosibel Smith said she found the books while working for the LAPD’s sex crimes unit during the 1993 allegations against Jackson. She described them as showing “...images of boys, some clothed, some nude, at play, swimming, jumping.”

The prosecution claims the books show Jackson’s prurient interest in adolescent boys — the “once a pedophile, always a pedophile” argument. The defense says both are perfectly legal to own, and that their inscriptions show Jackson’s harmless motives for keeping them.

On the flyleaf of one of the books: “To Michael, from your fan, Rhonda XXXOOO 1983, Chicago.”

On the other, an inscription written by Jackson himself: “Look at the true spirit and happiness on the faces of these boys. This is the spirit of boyhood, the childhood I never had. This is the life I want for my children. MJ.”

Jurors will not hear celebrity reporter
tell of "Neverland escape" phone call

I L L U S T R A T O N S   B Y   B I L L   R O B L E S

The jury was pulled from the courtroom a second time as attorneys argued over the possible testimony of US Weekly editor Ian Drew who conducted the Debbie Rowe interview that’s been the topic of so much discussion this week.

He was also supposed to have conducted the rebuttal video interview of Jackson’s accuser and family, though it never happened. The reason why is the subject of much debate.

The prosecution wanted Drew to testify that he was told by Jackson aide and unindicted co-conspirator Ronald Konitzer that the family had “escaped from the ranch in the middle of the night.”

The issue was complicated by the presence of Drew’s media attorney Kelly Sager, here to protect his unpublished information under the California shield law that safeguards journalistic sources.

Drew, who once worked for The Globe and occasionally appears on TV as a celebrity gossip-monger, is woven into the fabric of this case. He has a history of dealings with Konitzer and Mark Schaffel and is said to have served as a pipeline to the tabloids for positive Jackson PR. Judge Melville’s final ruling: the testimony would be more prejudicial than probative and Ian Drew is out.

A slow day, an unusual free-fall Friday in Judge Melville’s clockwork court. The jury was in and out of the box as debates raged over these two sets of evidence and the judge’s to-the-minute courtroom breaks were askew.

Still, War Protest Friday was held outside the courthouse as usual.

That’s it from Santa Maria.
Have a great weekend!
M

Debbie Rowe came to praise Jackson, not bury him

She lauds Jackson, double-deals the
prosecution, but more than anything —
she just wants to see her kids

I L L U S T R A T I O N S   B Y   B I L L    R O B L E S

Debbie Rowe had dinner with prosecutors at the Hitching Post in nearby Casmalia last night. This morning, she ate them for breakfast. She demolished the prosecution’s conspiracy case against Michael Jackson.

She spun Jackson’s rep from victimizer to victim. What was Tom Sneddon thinking when he put Jackson’s ex on the stand? Were prosecutors clueless as to what Rowe would say? Was it all a cunning tactic to win custody, or visitation rights with her children? More questions than answers.

She again contradicted prosecution claims that she was scripted in her appearance on a Fox TV show on Jackson’s behalf, post-Bashir. Though 105 questions had been prepared for her, she refused to look at them, she said, as she endured what she described as endless quizzing. “We were on that stupid couch for seven hours. We only stopped to change film,” she said.

Was she trying to protect Jackson from the accuser and his family? Yes, she said. “Michael is very easily manipulated, especially if he’s scared.”

She lavished praise, saying Jackson was “generous to a fault, giving and kind, a good father, great with kids, puts other people in front of him. A brilliant businessman. There are different ‘Michaels.’ There’s my Michael…” and then she began to cry. “...and the Michael everyone else sees — Michael the entertainer.” Across the courtroom, Jackson dabbed his eyes with tissues.

“I was excited to do it because I could see my children and rekindle my relationship with Michael.” And she tried, repeatedly, to see her kids.

She buddied up with Jackson aide Mark Schaffel, though she clearly despised him. Did she think Schaffel was using Jackson? “Oh, yeah!” She tried to warn Michael through her former boss, Jackson’s dermatologist — wanted to tell her ex, “Be careful of Mark!”

She phoned Schaffel for weeks to ask about when she could see Michael, her son and daughter. She was constantly put off. “He told me, ‘You’re gonna see the kids, they’re in Florida now, but Michael’s excited to see you.’ Obviously he’s full of s***. Sorry, your honor.”

She skewered Schaffel and Jackson aides (and unindicted co-conspirators) Dieter Wiesner and Ronald Konitzer as “opportunistic vultures” who profited from Jackson’s misery. She said Jackson associate Mark Schaffel bragged about having made $7 million from the rebuttal to the Bashir documentary.

She claims Schaffel told Jackson’s bookkeepers that she wanted $100,000 for her appearance. “I wouldn’t have taken the money. A check was cut. He kept it.”

She also said she tried to tell Santa Barbara sheriff’s deputies that Jackson was being victimized by his accuser and family. They did not listen.

“She singlehandedly destroyed the district attorney’s conspracy theory in this case,” says former prosecutor Michael Cardoza. “She distanced Jackson from his handlers. That helped Michael Jackson an awful lot.”

Do you still like Michael Jackson? “I’ve always been a friend.” Then, turning to Jackson, she added, “...if he’ll talk to me.”

Who’s responsible for your not seeing your kids? “He’s the father, ultimately it’s his decision,” Rowe said. “I want to believe it’s the people around Michael trying to keep me from getting my kids.”

Would she like to see her children now? She said that, once, she could have been introduced as a friend. “I can’t do that now,” she said. They’re too old, It’d be too traumatic. I can’t walk in and say, ‘Hey, I’m your mom, Wanna go out?’”

Tom Mesereau handled Rowe with more respect and deference than he has shown any other witness so far in this trial. He seemed blown away by the present he had just been given.

Mesereau: “What was your motivation to participate in the interview?”

Rowe: “My children.”

Mesereau: “No further questions, your honor.”

CBS News legal analyst Andrew Cohen says the last time Debbie Rowe did this much for Michael Jackson is when she gave birth to their second child, Paris. Here’s his take on this amazing day of testimony.

The district attorney made an offer of proof to the judge before Rowe took the stand, laying out what she would say. Prosecutors said Rowe would testify that she was scripted when she went on camera to record an interview for the Fox TV show The Michael Jackson Interview: The Scenes You Weren’t Meant To See. Instead, she testified that she refused to be scripted.

So what happened? Is this all about her ongoing custody battle in Los Angeles Family Court? We are told a new custody hearing will happen next month. Rowe’s legal bills have to be mounting, and her million-a-year divorce stipend from Jackson has been cut off since Rowe appreared on Entertainment Tonight to tell the story of her life.

If she changed her story, why didn’t the prosecution impeach her testimony — bring up her earlier interviews and challenge her with previous statements? We’ve got some great legal analysts here, and no one has a clue. District Attorney Tom Sneddon has some serious explaining ahead.

And what happened to yesterday’s cliffhanger?  Debbie Rowe — saying she lied on videotape when she said Jackson had good parenting skills? It didn’t come up at all.

Andrew Cohen believes that testimony was the topic of a closed meeting in chambers before the trial began. It’s only supposition, but perhaps the judge ruled that testimony would have wandered out of the narrow limits he’d set for Debbie Rowe’s appearance on the stand.

Those limits apparently worked in keeping out the nightmare testimony the defense has been fearing — talk of Jackson’s alleged drug use, his sexual habits, and how the couple’s children were conceived.

Rowe’s testimony is over, though her child custody drama continues in Los Angeles. The D.A. tries to pick up the pieces in the morning. Good night from Santa Maria.

 
 

Debbie Rowe stands by her ex

Far from being a vindictive ex-wife,
she scores points for Jackson's defense.
Is she betraying the prosecution?

F I N A L   E D I T I O N

ILLUSTRAIONS BY BILL ROBLES

It wasn’t a vengeful Debbie Rowe who took the stand. It was a mother who has not seen her children in nearly three years, but who began to cry when she said the last time she saw Michael Jackson was on the day of their divorce in 1999.

She identified herself as “Deborah Rowe Jackson” and startled the court in doing so. Deputy D.A. Ron Zonen immediately made it clear she would be called “Miss Rowe.”

She began by telling some of her backstory. She and Michael have never shared a home, she said, though they were married for two years and have known each other for 20 years or more. She served as nurse to Jackson’s dermatologist. That’s how they met.

Visitation rights following their divorce called for an 8-hour visit with her kids every 45 days. They were uncomfortable meetings, she said. She’d hook up with the kids in hotels — Jackson’s nannies too worried about the kids getting dirty from things like finger-painting and coloring for them to have any fun. “It was not a quality relationship,” she said, sort of explaining why she gave up custody of Prince Michael and Paris, 8 and 7 years old now.

She said she got a call from Michael days before the Martin Bashir special aired. He told her a video was coming out — one “full of lies.” Would she help? Yes, she said — readily agreeing because she had said she would always be there for Michael and the children. And when she agreed to go on camera to vindicate her ex-husband — was she scripted? “Absolutely not.” A serious hit for the prosecution.

“As Mr. Jackson knows, no can tell me what to say. I speak my own mind.” Was she given a list of questions? “It was offered to me and I declined. It was a cold interview and I wanted to keep it that way.”

She admitted lying in that interview when she spoke of Jackson having good parenting skills. Indeed, their custody battle over Paris and Prince Michael rages on in Los Angeles Family Court, predicated on her claim that Jackson is an unfit parent. Since this trial is all about Jackson’s relationships with children, this should be a major topic of investigation tomorrow by the prosecution.

The prosecution tried hard to get her to say that a visitation deal had been struck before she would make a video exonerating Jackson after Bashir, that Jackson was dangling her kids as bait in order to win her cooperation. In opening statements, the prosecution promised jurors she’d say so.

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Listen to CBS News legal analyst Andrew Cohen and Loyola Law School professor Laurie Levenson on Debbie Rowe's first day of testimony

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Rowe related a much softer version of that claim. She told Jackson she would like to be reintroduced to her children once the Bashir furor had died down. Michael, she said, agreed, but it hasn’t happened yet.

She cried again when she was asked if she would like to have been reintroduced to Michael and the children. Yes, she would. “He’s my friend” she said. Did Michael’s agreement to that reunion qualify as a deal? A broken promise? It’s fuzzy contract law, but it’s an opening for the prosecution.

Rowe was on the stand for only 38 minutes, so this was only the overture to her opera.

CBS News legal analyst Andrew Cohen says, “She ends up being a better defense witness than a prosecution witness and that effect is even more pronounced because prosecutors brought her. She looks like a reluctant witness on the stand, and yet is willing to help her ex-husband who hasn’t been that kind. Let’s face it.”

Maybe he didn’t want to be upstaged by Debbie Rowe. Maybe he wanted to dress up for his date with his ex. Michael Jackson broke his basic black dress code and was decked out in scarlet red — head to toe. Hamming it up for the TV cameras on his way into court, too, stopping to clasp his hands together in a prayer gesture and bowing. What was that about?

As Jackson left court for the day, he was asked what it was like to see Rowe again. “No comment,” he said. After all these years? Jackson just sorta shrugged.

T H I S   M O R N I N G . . .

Jackson videographer says
accuser's mom went scriptless, too

The mother of Michael Jackson’s accuser has said she and her family were rehearsed for 10 days before their interview for that rebuttal show. So how scripted were they? Not at all, said Jackson’s personal videographer Hamid Muslehi, who produced both shoots.

He says music video director Christian Robinson asked questions of the accuser’s family from a list he was holding. But as for rehearsal? Never happened, said Muslehi. The accuser, his brother and sister were playing video games at Muslehi’s house before the shoot began, and the mom was busy dealing with release forms or contracts.

Muslehi saw the mother memorizing nothing, never checking a script. He’s a prosecution witness but he’s doing them no favors. 

He says mom accepted a $2000 loan (which she has never repaid) after whining to Muslehi about her impoverished circumstances. Though as Mesereau had Muslehi point out, the mother never told the video guy she’d won a $150,000 judgment from J.C. Penney, was being supported by her army major boyfriend, had all those fundraisers... etc.

Muslehi is making the point that Jackson aides Ronald Konitzer and Dieter Wiesner were calling the shots, Konitzer telling Muslehi he was taking over Jackson’s management and business affairs. Mesereau is trying to put distance between them and Michael-as-Mastermind. Will Debbie say Jackson ran it all?

Oxman out, travel agent backs Brazil testimony, video guy shoots down accuser's mom

Longtime Jackson family lawyer Brian Oxman no longer "of counsel"

This has been brewing for some time. In mid-March, Court TV caught Oxman on videotape, yelling into his cell phone about harmony and respect — and making references to Jackson wanting to fire someone on his legal team.

There have been constant rumors for weeks here at the courthouse over how long Oxman would remain on this case. Thing is, he’s been with the Jackson family for 15 years, and there’s been growing friction with Tom Mesereau — who’s the 4th defense attorney Michael Jackson has had since being charged with child molestation.

There was Mark Geragos, Benjamin Braffman, and Steve Cochran — but Oxman was the continuity that ran through it all, even though he wasn’t given a speaking part in this courtroom drama other than to comment on Michael’s condition when Jackson came down with the flu.

He hadn’t been around the courthouse for a week. Court watchers say he wasn’t supposed to be here yesterday. But when he arrived, Jackson gave him a hug and a fan gave him a Bubbles the Chimp doll. When he walked into court, Oxman found no chair at the defense table — Mesereau and company telling him to sit in the public seats where he was handed his walking papers.

After court yesterday, we watched Oxman having an animated, finger-pointing conversation with Mesereau. And then they hugged. And then a terse court document by Mesereau was released by the court saying, “Please take notice that effective April 21, 2005, Mr. Brian Oxman will no longer be of counsel of record in this proceeding.”

No aspersions on Oxman, but Tom Mesereau isn’t the kind of man who suffers fools gladly. He likes things his way. He walked away from Robert Blake when Blake decided to plead his case to the public in an interview with Barbara Walters.

Oxman is a Loyola Law School graduate based in Santa Fe Springs. His former clients include former California governor Jerry Brown. His last big moment at trial? Being wheeled out of court on a gurney last month when he came down with pneumonia in his right lung.

This morning, Mesereai made two trips to the parking lot to fetch his legal documents. One less lawyer to help with the heavy lifting.

O N   T H E   S T A N D
Travel agent backs up the tale of
banishment to Brazil. Accuser's mom
not crazy after all? But was Jackson
in on the plot?

Prosecutors searched for a smoking gun. A smoking plane ticket actually, through the testimony of travel broker Cynthia Montgomery. On February 25, 2003, Montgomery reserved seats for the accuser, his mother, brother and sister on a commercial flight from Los Angeles to São Paulo, Brazil departing March 1.

Ticket price for coach: $15,092. “They were open tickets,” she explained, “they’re expensive.”

Mark Schaffel, a Jackson aide and business partner in Neverland Valley Entertainment, made the reservations and wanted the tickets to be one-way, said Montgomery, backing the prosecution’s contention that banishment to Brazil was to have been permanent. Brazil, however, doesn’t allow visitors carrying only one-way passage, so Montgomery made ‘em round trip, picking the return date out of a hat.

11520 Trent Court, Calabasas, California was the address given for the accuser’s family by Schaffel, but a check of online maps and the postal service Zip code database shows no such address exists. A deputy took the stand late in the morning and said as much.

Montgomery also corroborated previous testimony by flight attendants that Jackson requested his wine be put in soda cans when he flew on charter flights, but she contradicted stewardess Cindy Bell’s claim the idea was hers. Montgomery says the pop can gag was strictly Jackson’s.

But wait! The Brazil tickets were never purchased. That came out under Tom Mesereau’s cross examination. Schaffel had told Montgomery there was a change of plan, though he flew off to São Paulo on his on, on schedule. Schaffel reportedly has a porn studio there.

Had Montgomery ever talked to Jackson or the accuser’s family about the flights? No, she said, as Mesereau tried to put distance between Jackson and the alleged plot, and tried to link Montgomery to Schaffel. They have known each other some 20 years.

There was also plenty of character assassination. “You are testifying under what’s called ‘immunity,’ right?” Mesereau began. “And if you didn’t receive a grant of immunity you wouldn’t testify here today?” Montgomery claimed that tactic was her attorney’s idea. “That’s what he gets paid for.” The jury launched into note-taking mode, big time.

Montgomery is facing an ongoing FBI investigation into the illegal videotaping of Jackson as he flew on a chartered XtraJet from Las Vegas to Santa Barbara on the day of his arrest. Later, those tapes would be offered for sale to the media. Montgomery arranged the flight, and tagged along in an XtraJet chase plane, but was never reimbursed for the $50,000 she plunked down in cash at XtraJet’s Santa Monica office. She’s now suing Jackson for the tab.

Turns out Montgomery is something of a snitch, too. She became a Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Department informant and provided corroboration to their claims that Jackson was not manhandled by deputies when he surrendered. She also secretly taped phone conversations with deputies.

V I D E O   P R O D U C E R   T R U M P S   M O M
Jackson videographer shoots rebuttals,
blows holes accuser's mom's story

Hamid Muslehi produced two rebuttal videos. One featured Jackson’s ex Debbie Rowe. In the other — the accuser, his mother and family. But in his testimony today, Muslehi shot down the mom’s contention she’d been forcibly rehearsed for her performance over ten grueling days.

As Muslehi told it, the video came together so quickly, so in a panic, it’s hard to see how rehearsals could have happened. He says the idea of making a rebuttal video was never broached with the mother until hours before it took place.

The kids were at Neverland. Muslehi, too. He phoned the mother, then in Los Angeles. She was against the idea at first, saying, since the Bashir special had aired, “my life has been turned upside-down. The last thing I want is another video.”

But within hours, she was center stage and tape was rolling at Muslehi’s house. Jackson associate Mark Schaffel wanted to shoot it there because he didn’t want the accuser’s mom to know where he lived, Muslehi testified.

Muslehi had driven the kids to L.A. in his BMW, followed by his camera crew. Neverland manager Joe Marcus had told him the kids were not allowed to leave the property, but it’s unclear whether that qualifies as imprisonment, or something more benign — the house rule that kids unaccompanied by parents were not to leave the ranch.

Muslehi said nothing about a script — a document that must have been as thick as The Lord of the Rings trilogy in order to cover all the verbatim dialogue, laughter and outtakes the mother claims had been written for her and the kids.

Muslehi's second video profiled Jackson ex Debbie Rowe, though he had little to say about it. Just this: it had been shot Mark Schaffel’s home. Music video director Christopher Robinson was there, along with an interviewer. Schaffel took the tapes.

Muslehi says he has been stiffed for a quarter million dollars for this, and other work by Jackson. Like Montgomery and God knows how many others, he has joined the long line of folks with suits pending the King of Pop.

Tomorrow, Rowe will likely testify that Jackson called her to leverage visitation rights with their children Paris and Prince Michael if Rowe would play ball and record that video.

Her testimony will be the climax of the prosecution case and a stellar moment of courtroom drama and Zen. Be here tomorrow for the scoop. K?

Jackson former wife Debbie Rowe on stand by week's end

Sneddon loses Chris Carter, scores big
with an angry ex on a custody quest

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BULLETIN: Attorney Brian Oxman removed from Jackson defense team. In a terse statement to the court, Thomas Mesereau writes, “Please take notice that effective April 21, 2005, Mr. Brian Oxman will no longer be of counsel of record in this proceeding.” The move follows months of sometimes acrimonious arguments between Sneddon and Oxman, a longtime Jackson family attorney. CBS News Legal Analyst Andrew Cohen has the full story.   

Jackson ex Debbie Rowe to testify Thursday or Friday. Her testimony will be narrow, focusing on the exculpatory video she made on Jackson’s behaf. Coached, she will say, just like the accuser’s family. Sneddon will nod, knowingly.

The defense tried hard to keep her out, arguing that the prosecution has never materialized a script for those praise-videos Rowe and the mother of the accuser were supposedly under pressure to make.

Mesereau also said he would be compelled to play (and dissect) all three hours of raw footage of the Rowe rebuttal video in court if MJ’s ex took the stand.

Tom Sneddon wants the jury to hear Rowe’s claim that Jackson threatened to cut off visitation to Prince Michael and Paris unless she acquiesced to the PR stunt. But the deep dish dirt isn’t about the script — it’s about Jackson’s alleged drug use (Vanity Fair says Jackson has done detox at least twice), his sexual behavior, and how the two children Rowe produced for Jackson were conceived, and how they live at Neverland.

How much of that will make it into the trial? Not much, if the judge has his way. Soon as the judge opens the door to character testimony, the defense will want to counter with scads of character witnesses that would expand this trial ad infinitum. Still, count on all of the nastiness of the former couple’s ongoing family court spat to spill over here, and count on Tom Mesereau to do his best to blacken Rowe’s rep in any way he can.

What happens in Vegas stays there. On-again, off-again witness and accused bank robber, kidnapper and fast food stickup artist Chris Carter is now off again. He was scheduled to fly in again (been here once, did not testify) from Las Vegas where he’s awaiting local and federal trials. A deal between Carter and Tom Sneddon’s team is said to have fallewn apart  over the weekend and the prosecution pulled Carter from its witness list this morning. This, after hard fighting for his inclusion last Thursday.

It’s a prosecution setback. No one other than the accuser’s brother has testified about kids looped out on Jesus Juice. Carter would have — an adult and a security guard, though badly tarnished and probably asking for lots from Sneddon — what with the charges facing him in Sin City.

No minor royals at King of Pop trial! Lord Alex Montagu (listed among British peerage as Viscount Mandeville Baron Montagu Alexander Charles David Drogo Montagu) visited Neverland with his son in the late 90s after Jackson phoned his boy dozens of times. The kid went missing during a screening at Neverland’s theater and was found wiht Michael in Jackson’s bedroom 90 minutes later.

The viscount was enraged and said Jackson henchmen have threatened him. His son said it was all innocent. Jackson’s defense called his possible testimony a “desperation move to dirty-up the case.” The judge agreed. The viscount’s down for the count.

Cynthia Montgomery back in. Jackson’s travel coordinator who booked the accuser’s one-way tickets to Brazil. An immunity deal’s been worked out protecting her testimony from federla prosecution in an upcoming trial involving her allegedly rolling tape on Jackson in a rental jet on his way to his Santa Barbara surrender. As of today, she’s back in — after being scratched Thursday.

Still on the hot seat schedule: porn producer Mark Schaffel and cameraman Hamid Moslehi along with Rowe and Montgomery.

Tears during former security guard’s
Vaseline-free, low-carb testimony

Former Jackson security guard Kasim Abdool cried on the stand as he told of death threats against himself and his family for testifying against Jackson in a 1994 grand jury investigation. The threats were serious enough for Abdool to ask about witness protection programs, he claimed. But his testimony was a shadow of what it could have been. His story had been defanged by the judge.

Abdool only told the court that he saw Jackson give his ’93 accuser a piggyback ride from Jacuzzi to house wearing only towels and a robe, and found two pairs of swimming shorts on the wet floor of the changing room that night in 1993.

Jackson, he said, uncharacteristically locked the house himself that night. It was lite corroboration of the testimony of fellow security guard Ralph Chacon who says he witnessed an oral sex act between Jackson and the boy in the Jacuzzi-and-pool changing room that night.

Per the judge’s order, Abdool did not testify about bringing a jar of Vaseline to a “sweaty” and “aroused” Jackson one night when a boy was hanging out in the pop star’s bedroom.

Abdool had clearance to testify he saw Jackson give the boy a hug and a peck on the cheek as they gazed upon the illuminated Peter Pan tableau at Neverland. A Kodak moment.

Like Chacon, Abdool is one of the “Neverland Five,” those disgruntled former security guards who sued Jackson, asked for millions, and lost their shirts — $1.4 million each to be exact.

The hardcore press corps has heard this story before, and in color. We want Debbie!

Jackson’s Hell Week: Angry ex, snitch producer, deceased Beatle take aim

©  G E T T Y   I M A G E S

BULLETIN: (11:15am Monday) Rowe's a go. Despite lasty-minute attempts to derail possible witness Debbie Rowe, Judge Henry Melville has just ruled her admissible. The prosecution, however, has decided against calling former Neverland employee Chris Carter to the stand. The fought hard for him Friday. What went wrong?

Jackson ex Debbie Rowe, the mother of Paris and Prince Michael, called Michael “a wonderful man and father” as she handed over custody of the two kids. She’s not expected to be as effusive in pop star praise this week.

Rowe is likely to testify that she was heavily scripted in an interview for a rebuttal film that heaped adoration on Jackson in the wake of the Martin Bashir documentary. Just like the mom of Jackson’s current accuser? Could be serious corroboration.

Bad blood all around. Rowe is seeking custody of Prince Michael and Paris, saying Jackson is unfit to be a parent. That drama is being played out behind closed doors in Los Angeles Family Court. Rowe had been getting a million a year and a Beverly Hills mansion, though Jackson has now reportedly cut off her benefits. Prince Michael is 8, Paris 7. Both are expected to testify on behalf of their dad.

What other beans is this former plastic surgeon’s nurse expected to spill? Rowe signed a confidentiality agreement as part of her 1999 divorce, preventing her from disclosing anything about Jackson’s “mental or physical condition, purported drug use, sexual behavior” or the children's lifestyle, but her subpoena trumps that pact.

A scorned woman is just the start of Jackson’s hell week. A close friend may clinch the conspiracy charges, and lay them squarely on Jackson’s doorstep.

False imprisonment vidence on tape? In writing? Celebrity Justice says Rudy Provencio will also take the stand for the prosecution to back up the mom’s claims she and the kids were nearly banished to Brazil. Provencio is a record producer and a member of Jackson’s inner circle in early 2003. He dutifully kept a journal of his meetings at Neverland and secretly recorded phone conversations that could be powerful evidence of conspiracy.

The mom has adamantly denied defense claims that the South America trip was a three-week vacation. Provencio could provide proof it was to have been a permanent move, and that Michael Jackson was in on the alleged plot.

Also on tap, accused bank robber and kidnapper Chris Carter with accounts drinking by Jackson’s accuser and how the King of Pop allegedly said the hard stuff would make a man of the boy. But the Santa Maria Courthouse is only one venue for Jackson’s legal woes.

The estate of George Harrison is suing Michael Jackson, claiming he and Sony have shortchanged the late Beatle to the tune of $1.8 million dollars. At issue, dozens of songs written by Harrison but controlled by Jackson and Sony, including “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” The Telegraph has the story from London.

Was Michael Jackson molested as a boy? The New York Post quotes a Harlem woman who babysat for the Jackson kids as saying 10-year-old Michael Jackson bragged to her that a “world-renowned” female celebrity was having sexual relations with him.

“It has bothered me for 35 years,” said Antoinette Holmes, who said the confession by the young Jackson came at the Essex Hotel, where the Jacksons were staying while performing at the Apollo Theater.

Pope Daddy Michael the First? Scary thought, but the Rock and Roll Tarot card depicting MJ as il pappa is for real, and currently on the block at eBay where its seller says, “Tarot card collectors, art collectors, music memorabilia, card collections, cannot do without this card!” Asking price: $3.95

And in sports... The crowd goes wild at Michael Jackson: Beat It Night, a gala thrown by California Double-A baseball team The Lake Elsinore Storm. From OurSports Central:   

“Opposing team headshots were all pictures of Michael Jackson throughout his life... In-game entertainment included a baby toss that saw two fans throwing baby dolls and attempting to catch them in strollers on the third base line.”

The Storm beat the High Desert Mavericks, 12-2.

Dark day

A dark day for court. Judge, jury — all off. Jackson’s most likely hunkered down at Neverland, nursing his back problems which were flaring up again on Wednesday.

On the Web, the comic book pictured above is on sale for five bucks at this writing. The cover image says it all: Michael Jackson in yet another strange Neverland, staked out in torment. As a yellow snake slithers closer to his face, Jackson turns away. In comic books, as in life, the King of Pop depicted as a victim of bizarre and sinister plots by perps shown as tiny by comparison. Iconic?

If you twist the letters in Michael Jackson’s name into an anagrammatic pretzel, you come up with JAIL SCAM? HECK NO. Ironic?

Everyone in the courthouse seemed itchy and fatigued as the prosecution lobbied for its final burst of evidence Thursday. What last-minute horror stories lie ahead? How much deeper will we sink into the world of doo-doo heads and blowholes? Does redemption lie ahead? Graphic testimony follows...

Flashbacks from the nineties as the week drew to a mercifully early close. We are told about Jackson, calling down for Vaseline from a bedroom where he’s hanging with a 12 or 13-year-old boy. He’s described as sweaty, aroused. The jury won’t hear of it, tho. Only lite corroboration of the oral sex scene near the Jacuzzi. No new prior allegations, says the judge, who’s drawn the line on 1108 testimony.

Jackson’s travel agent has been nixed, too. She secretly rolled videotape in the cabin of Jackson’s rent-a-jet as he winged from Vegas to Santa Barbara to submit to arrest. She tried to hawk the tape to the networks and Sanger says the FBI is on her trail. She’d have taken the Fifth, but could have told about booking one-way tickets to Brazil for the accuser and his family.

Chris Carter will join the Michael Jackson Fifth Amendment Club, and he’ll fly in from Vegas, too — in cuffs and chains, no Jesus Juice. There will be no talk of Carter’s alleged armed robberies and bank robberies, or the kidnapping and weapons charges he faces back in Sin City. He’ll only tell of a drunken accuser and a Jackson who urged the kid on.

The mother? She’s paranoid, says the prosecution — though they couldn’t convince Judge Melville to allow an expert witness explain how badly this woman has been damaged by battered wife syndrome. Too prejudicial, too time-consuming. Advantage: defense.

A young Jackson cousin who will only be known to the court as "the male witness" will be allowed to testify to a key point made by the accuser and his brother. They told the court they knew nothing of self-gratification until Jackson introduced them to it. This boy will testify he caught the brothers in the act, earlier. Of course, being a Jackson, his possibile prejudice will be probed by the prosecution.

It's heavy stuff. And it’s reverberating from Clifton to Hollywood. A teenage Jackson protégé in New Jersey is arrested for sex with a 14-year-old girl. Says he learned his smooth moves from Jackson at Neverland, saw him seduce a girl there. Macaulay Culkin tests the waters before committing to taking the stand, his 2004 drug arrest not helping matters. Who on Jackson’s starpower A-list will take the plunge and stand for the man? Diana? Stevie? Smokey? Liz?

Can Jay Leno put the courtroom in a happier mood? This is a very tough house.

Cop pins blame on Jackson, judge hands down new rules

Jackson said responsible for order to keep accuser held at Neverland

A second day of testimony by Guadalupe police officer Brian Barron who said he saw a memo to security guards while he was moonlighting at Neverland saying Jackson’s current accuser was not allowed to leave the ranch. [See story]

Defense attorney Robert Sanger did an excellent job of numbing the court into oblivion by walking the cop through zillions of ranch gate entries that chronicle the comings and goings of Neverland employees, Jackson associates and the accuser and his family.

He was trying to prove that key witnesses, including the accuser and his family, were wrong about when they said they were at the ranch, perhaps even trying to prove Jackson’s accuser was not sleeping in the pop star’s bedroom on the nights the alleged molestation took place.

But under redirect, the prosecution cleared up the mystery. The logs were in error. A long fishing trip, no fish.

Still the cop’s testimony stands. The greaseboard note is incriminating evidence and a possible overt act to consiracy to falsely imprison the accuser and his family. Under redirect officer Barron laid the evidence at Jackson’s feet by saying Michael was ultimately responsible for all such directives.

Judge's rulings tip scales
slightly in Jackson's favor
In motions hearings this afternoon, Jackson’s guys foughthard to keep out testimony by Kassim Abdool, a former Neverland employee who claims he was asked to bring a jar of Vaseline to a sweaty and aroused Jackson in the pop star’s bedroom where he was hanging out the boy who became Jackson’s 1993 accuser.

Abdool was one of several employees who lost a wrongful termination lawsuit to Jackson in 1997 and were ordered to pay $1.4 million in damages Jackson. The defense says it’s prejudicial and inflammatory evidence.

The judge ruled that Abdool could corroborate a former security guard’s testimony that he saw Jackson kiss and engage in oral sex with his 1993 accuser, but the Vaseline story is out.

No explaining mom. The judge also ruled against a prosecution request that an expert witness in Battered Wife Syndrome testify as to why the accuser’s mom lief under oath that her husband never beat her, and other elements of her sometimes bizarre behavior. Judge Melville said that while such testimony is valuable in domestic violence cases, he banned it here because it would be prejudicial and burn up too much court time.

In other rulings...

• The defense can call witnesses who will say they never saw Jackson engage in improper behavior with children, but he'll weigh their relevance  on a case-by-case basis.
  
  
• The defense can call Manuel Ramirez, the boyfriend of the sister of Michael Jackson’s accuser, but urged the defense to call him quickly since Ramirez is in the Marines and waiting to be shipped out.
  
  
• The defense can call a young cousin of Jackson who will only be referred to as "the male witness." He could be key to disproving claims by the accuser and his brother that they knew nothing about masturbation until Jackson introduced the subject. The boy is expected to testify he saw the two engage in self-gratification long before.
  
  
• Accused bank robber, kidnapper and armed robber Chris Carter will testify, but neither prosecution nor defense can bring up his current legal troubles. It is unclear as to whether the judge will tell the jury that Carter is pleading the Fifth Amendment.
  
  
• Cynthia Montgomery will not testify at all. She's Jackson's former travel coordinator and would have testified for the prosecution that she booked one-way tickets to Brazil for the accuser and his family at Mark Schaffel's direction. She's currently under investigation by the FBI, says the defense, for secretly videotaping Jackson in the cabin of his charted jet as he flew from Las Vegas to Santa Barbara on the day he surrendered for arrest, and then trying to sell the tapes to the media.
  
  

One less defense witness. 18-year-old Ahmad Elatab was on the defense’s witness list because he is a staunch Jackson supporter. He became buddies with Jackson’s current accuser and was told by the boy that Jackson had cured his cancer through meditation.

Elatab met Jackson at an event held in the wake of 9/11 by the pop star to show he bears no ill-feelings toward Arab-Americans. Their friendship grew and Jackson flew Elatab to Neverland several times, and treated him to one of those fabulous Toys-R-Us shopping sprees. Though on his last visit to Neverland, which Elatab paid for himself, he found the gates to the ranch closed to him.

But Elatab has just been charged with having sex with a 14-year-old girl in New Jersey. The victim told police that as Elatab seduced her, said he "learned how to be that way from Michael Jackson" — and claimed he saw Jackson seduce a girl at Neverland. 

Elatab says the sex was consensual. Doesn’t matter — the girl’s under the age of consent. Will all of this make a difference in this case? Probably not. The jury will not hear any of it, unless they catch the story on the news outside of court,whicfh they are not supposed to do.

In other news...

• Tales of the Wild Boys, Part 27: Shane Brando ran over someone’s foot with one of Neverland’s motorized go-carts, then smack into Jackson’s accuser. His cart keys were taken away.
  
  
• A source close to Macaulay Culkin says the actor plans to testify on behalf of Jackson after all, though Culkin’s publicist won’t confirm it. Culkin is godfather to Jackson’s kids Prince Michael and Paris.

Court is dark on Friday.

Neverland guard: “Keep the kid on the ranch”

“We weren’t allowed to allow him off the property.” If the boy tried to leave? “We wouldn’t let him pass without authorization.” 

The prosecution has its overt act. Conspiracy charges need at least one, along with at least one conspirator acting on it. We’ve heard about the alcohol, heard about the sex.

Now, it’s all about false imprisonment by Michael Jackson and an order to Neverland security guards to block his young accuser from leaving Neverland Ranch.

Brian Barron is a cop with the nearby Guadalupe Police Department. He spent years moonlighting as a security guard at Neverland until sheriff’s deputies raided the ranch in 2003.

A month later, Santa Barbara sheriff’s detective Craig Bonner asked Barron to become an undercover informant at the ranch, but Barron declined. He quit his part-time Jackson gig on the advice of his chief. The ranch coulda been a crime scene, after all.

Barron bolstered the prosecution’s false imprisonment charges by testifying that he saw a directive, posted on a message board at Neverland’s security office saying, “(Accuser’s name) is not allowed off property” during January and February 2003 when the fallout from the Martin Bashir documentary was at its most intense. Barron said he now knows there was a similar entry in the log in the guard shack near Neverland’s main gate.

Under cross examination, defense attorney Robert Sanger got Barron to reveal that it was general policy for children not accompanied by adults to leave the ranch. “Were his parents present at the time that directive was issued?” asked Sanger? Barron replied, “I don’t know.”

But a big question was left hanging. If it was general policy to keep kids from straying off the ranch, why single out the accuser for special notice? Sanger tried to minimize the fallout. “When you spoke with the accuser’s mother, did it appear she wanted to be on the ranch?” Yes. “When you saw the accuser and his brother, it appeared as though they did not want to be at the ranch?” No.

“As a sworn police officer, you would have been duty-bound to investigate or make an arrest if you saw anything illegal,” said Sanger. Barron replied there was no need. He never saw any wrongdoing at the ranch, adding it was a wonderful place for kids.

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Listen to former prosecutor and legal analyst Susan Filan at the end-of-court media briefing

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Sanger spent nearly an hour pouring over Neverland security logs with Barron’s help. Barron wasn’t present when most of the entries were made, but could interpret their meaning. And though his cross examination will continue tomorrow, entries in these logs have fogged the timeline. They show, for instance, that the accuser and his family arrived at the ranch on the night Bashir’s special aired. His mom says they were in Miami with Jackson. Expect Sanger to build on this tomorrow.

And the log reveals it was Jackson secretary Katie Bernard who took the mom into Los Olivos for that infamous leg wax, not Jackson aide Vinnie Amen as the mom has emphatically claimed. In her testimony, the mom said Bernard hadn’t been present.

The logs also show no attempt to stop Jackson’s Rolls Royce as it left the ranch at 1:38am on the morning of February 12, 2003 in what the mother describes as an escape from Neverland. The car was driven by Jackson ranch manager Jesus Salas. Inside, the accuser, his mother, sister and brother.

Barron also gave jurors another glimpse into wildness of Neverland’s wild boys. Three local teens, “The Los Olivos Boys,” were especially destructive, said Bonner. “They egged the security chief’s car. We’re talking dozens of eggs.”

And there was the day Jackson’s accuser smashed the Batman golf cart in the Neverland theater fountain, smashing in its left front fender. The Accident Damage Report called it “reckless driving” and the boy was warned to slow down, or the cart would be taken away.    

The writing on the wall — the wall of one of the media pool’s porta potties, that is.

Mom vs. Mesereau: Day 3 | Money, celebrity and that J.C. Penney incident

As Jackson fans railed about the often bizarre testimony by the mother of Jackson’s accuser, there was only a brief attempt by the prosecution to rehabilitate this star witness.

Maybe the prosecution was only trying to fence off the field agaisnt any new cross examination plowing by Jackson’s defense.

Within an hour, she was back on the defense hot seat and finished with her testimony before noon.

Tom Mesereau took advantage of the door left open by the prosecution yesterday to draw out the mother’s story of what happened in that J.C. Penney assault case seven years ago.

The mother testifyed that security guards grabbed her hair and twisted her head, just like in The Exorcist, she said.

She also claimed she was handcuffed and dragged around a parking lot as guards fondled her breasts. Her two young sons had to tuck them back inside her bra since she was handcuffed.

She said she thought she was going to die. Her husband never came to her aid, though her hand was broken when guards “stomped on it” as they shouted racial slurs. “They were over-zealous,” she said. The guards were responding to reports that her son had left a store with unpaid merchandise.

She also claimed the guards spat pumpkins seeds at her family, spat in her youngest son’s face and broke the elbow of her son, the accuser.

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Listen to legal analyst Anne Bremner’s take on five days of testimony by the accuser's mom

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She said at the time that she wasn’t going to sue, but changed her mind a year later and won a $150,000 cash settlement. She claims she only wanted an apology, but Mesereau alleged she’d asked for a million in damages. The woman denied it. There was never an explanation of what, if any, police charges were ever filed against the family over allegations of burglary, theft and resisting arrest.

So who took those photos? The pix shown to the court yesterday, of the woman — black and blue — and her son with his broken elbow in a sling? A commercial photographer, hired by her attorney.

Defense attorney Tom Mesereau suggested the wounds and bruises came from the woman’s husband. She said they weren’t obvious at first because she was wearing makeup, but within minutes she also testified that her abusive ex, who she said would sometimes hold her head under water, never allowed her to wear makeup.

But if it was all a scam, why did J.C. Penney pay off? As former prosecutor Susan Filan said here, $150,000 is a lot more than companies dole out to settle a nuisance suit.

Then, on to more money matters. Under cross examination, the woman claimed she was oblivious to the money coming in from fundraisers for her son — even though she’d set up a bank account at Washington Mutual in her son’s name and was its only signatory.

She claimed she never knew where the money was coming from, including money wired into the account from Chris Tucker and from good friend Louise Palanker who supposedly never spoke with the mom about $20,000 the comedian gave in two checks, one made payable to the mother — who endorsed it. All of this, she claimed, was the doing of her husband who she said treated her “like a personal secretary.” She claimed she never attended any of the fundraisers being held for her son.

She said much of the money went to the construction of a clean room in which her cancer-ridden son could recover. But though that room was built in her mother’s home, the accuser’s mother was never included in discussions about it, never saw the room being prepared, never talked to the contractor, was totally out of the loop.

Sound like a mom deeply concerned about her son’s recovery? It was all her husband’s doing, she said again. She was oblivious to what he was up to.

Jay Leno’s name came up again. The mom said she never asked the Tonight Show star for money, and was never present during any conversations her son may have had with Leno. (Leno has said otherwise.) She also attempted to distance herself from allegations that she dogged celebrities for money, saying she never knew that family friends including comedian George Lopez, Laugh Factory owner Jamie Masada and TV weatherman Fritz Coleman were conducting fundraisers.

Had she spent some of that money on cosmetic surgery for herself? “That was on a credit card,” she said, “and it’s still outstanding.”

Mom is courtroom history, at least for now. But she left the court with far more questions than answers, and under that cloud of having taken the 5th Amendment to protect herself against self-incrimination for welfare fraud and perjury.

The mother’s mother took the stand briefly and testified in Spanish that she pretended to be ill so that her granschildren  would be released by Jackson. She said many calls came from Neverland during the time Jackson associates were said to be frantically urging the mother and her kids to return to the ranch, and that someone threw rocks at the windows of her home. Jackson’s defense team had no questions.

By afternoon, it was becoming apparent the prosecution was running out of witnesses. They padded their case with more sheriff’s deputies, describing the raid on Neverland. Why?

Former Neverland security guard Chris Carter has apparently joined The 5th Amendment Club. He was brought to Santa Maria a week ago to testify that he saw Jackson’s accuser drunk on the ranch, and that Michael had said it was okay.

Trouble is, Carter is facing trial in Las Vegas for bank robery, armed robbery, kidnapping and weapons charges making him the dirtiest witness yet for the prosecution. He doesn’t want to incriminate himself at this trial, he’s got bigger probs. So until a deal goes down to protect this accused felon, Carter is back in a Clark County jail.

Prosecutors say they may end their case by the end of next week. Will Janet Jackson appear at the trial’s halftime show?