Jackson Trial : Defense gets accuser's brother to admit lies - Page 2 - Big Big Forums

Jolie Rouge · 03-19-2005, 11:20 PM

Anticipating a question that surely has gone through the minds of jurors, Mesereau also focused Monday upon the idea that the young man and his family had a motive to ruin Jackson's life. Why would a young man do this?

Because, Mesereau suggested with his questions, the young man and his family were chronic complainers, career gold diggers, freeloaders and grifters who turned against Jackson when he and his entourage began to withdraw their significant perks and services from them. The accuser apparently complained when the vehicle Jackson gave his family took it back to repair it.

And he apparently complained that the expensive watch that Jackson had given him wasn't worth what Jackson had told him it was worth. If that is gratitude, if that is appreciation, then this right now is a close case.

It also bodes ill for prosecutors that they twice seemed surprised by defense questions. First, they apparently were taken aback by the discovery that the dean would testify that the accuser had told him that no molestation occurred. Apparently, prosecutors only questioned this dean on Saturday, two days ago, and then had to meet with the alleged victim Sunday evening to discuss the development. In a case like this, that's unacceptable footwork on the part of law enforcement officials and the District Attorneys' Office, who long ago should have talked to every single faculty member at every single school the young man has attended.

Also, the alleged victim told jurors that he had not been asked by prosecutors about Jay Leno until after the trial started, implying that prosecutors did not know that Jay Leno would play a role in this case until the defense said he would during opening statements. Leno, it now appears, will be a defense witness, called to testify that he, too, was approached by the young man and his family as part of a solicitation effort. In these circumstances, it is inexcusable that Sneddon did not know about that before trial or, if he did, that he did not discuss it with his witness. Inexcusable, but not necessarily inconsistent with some of the other dubious decisions and developments so far in the case that left Thomas Sneddon, the District Attorney, shaking his head inside court late Monday morning.

Dressed in a royal blue dress shirt with a white t-shirt underneath, the young man is short-haired and good looking with a voice that is deeper than his age suggests. But when he testifies, he talks as though he is recalling a story that he has read and not as though he is retelling his own experiences. In that sense, he seems as over-coached and scripted as he seems under-coached in other areas of his testimony. Have jurors picked up on this? I don't know. Recognizing the core of the case when they see it, many of them were furiously scribbling notes Monday. And they were as attentive as you would hope they would be, focusing in upon the young man as he answered, or didn't, the questions posed to him.

Surely, in the end, they will cut the accuser some slack on some of what he says. Being the fulcrum of a case like this surely would not be easy for a mature adult, much less a young person just beginning to understand the real world. And surely there is a lot of detail for him to remember over a long period that marks the beginning and end of his relationship with the defendant. The problem for prosecutors, however, is that there is only so much of a break the jury is likely to cut the accuser, especially when Jackson is entitled to "breaks" of his own, constitutionally-mandated breaks like the presumption of innocence and the reasonable doubt standard.

If I were a member of the jury tonight, I would more likely be wondering why this case was brought in the first place than I would whether or not Jackson is guilty of the charges against him. And that is a horrible calculus for prosecutors now, smack dab in the middle of their case-in-chief. Why? Because with the most dramatic parts of his presentation nearly over, and with a deck stacked with defense witnesses, if Sneddon doesn't have the jury now he likely never will.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...in680053.shtml

Jolie Rouge · 03-24-2005, 01:05 AM

Jackson prosecution witness jailed in robbery spree
Charges may deal blow to state's case against pop star
Thursday, March 24, 2005

SANTA MARIA, California (CNN) -- In a twist likely to further complicate the prosecution's efforts to convict Michael Jackson, a former bodyguard expected to be a key witness against the pop star is sitting in a Las Vegas jail, facing a slew of felony charges stemming from four armed robberies.

A spokeswoman for the Clark County, Nevada, district attorney's office confirmed that Christopher Eric Carter, 25, was indicted Wednesday on 15 counts, including first-degree kidnapping, burglary, robbery, coercion and possession of a firearm by an ex-felon.

According to the indictment, Carter had been convicted in 2000 in Maryland on drug and escape charges, two years before he went to work for Jackson.

The victims in the kidnapping counts were targets of the robberies and were patrons inside businesses who were held against their will, according to the indictment. The serious felony charges are likely to damage the credibility of Carter, who has testified he witnessed Jackson and his teenage accuser drinking alcohol together during an airplane flight.

The first armed robbery Carter is accused of committing in Las Vegas was on October 29, 2003 -- about two months after he left Jackson's employ and before he testified before the Santa Barbara County grand jury that indicted the pop star in April 2004.

According to court documents, Carter was arrested February 19 after his fingerprints matched those left on a freezer by a man who robbed a Jack In The Box restaurant on February 2, wearing a mask made from a white T-shirt with holes cut out for the eyes. FBI agents found the mask while searching Carter's garbage. The robbery netted just $239, according to police.

Carter was being held on $265,000 bond, according to court documents. He is to appear in court Monday to face charges.

According to his testimony before the grand jury that indicted Jackson, Carter worked as a security guard for Jackson from August 2002 to August 2003, during the time when the accuser says Jackson molested him at Neverland ranch. He said it was his decision to leave Jackson's employ and that he then moved to Las Vegas.

Carter told grand jurors he saw both Jackson and the boy drinking alcohol from soda cans while on a flight from Miami to California in February 2003. He also said he saw the boy "stumbling" drunk one afternoon at the ranch, and the boy indicated to him that Jackson condoned his drinking.

Carter also said that after the trip from Miami, the accuser's mother asked him to take her off the ranch in the middle of the night, without her children. She was upset and prayed throughout the drive to Los Angeles, he said.

The prosecution contends that the accuser and his family were held against their will at Neverland by Jackson's associates after the Miami trip and that the mother was fearful for their safety.

According to transcripts of the grand jury, Carter also said Jackson had the ability to monitor phone conversations at Neverland and once showed him a tape he had made of a phone conversation he had recorded.

CNN's Stan Wilson contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/03/24/ja...ess/index.html

Jolie Rouge · 03-31-2005, 01:02 AM

[b]Jurors hear Jackson case origins
Psychologist and lawyer describe roles in starting case
Wednesday, March 30, 2005 [/i]

SANTA MARIA, California (CNN) -- Jurors in the Michael Jackson trial learned more details Wednesday about how authorities first learned of child molestation allegations against the pop star.

The testimony came from the same lawyer and psychologist involved in similar charges made against him a decade ago.

Wednesday's court appearance by Dr. Stan Katz, a Beverly Hills psychologist who also treated a boy who accused the singer of a sex crime a decade ago, was widely anticipated to be a key moment in the trial.

But he was on the stand for only about an hour, after truncated questioning by the prosecution did not give the defense much room to grill him on cross-examination.

Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Rodney Melville had ruled earlier that Katz couldn't tell jurors whether he thought Jackson's teenage accuser and his family were credible, or whether he believed the events they described actually happened.

Katz testified he conducted eight interviews in May and June 2003 with the accuser and his mother, brother and sister. He did not provide details of what they told him.

After the interviews, however, he said he informed Larry Feldman -- the attorney who hired him to "help sort things out" with the family -- that they needed to report abuse allegations to authorities.

The family told the state Division of Children and Family Services and the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department, which launched an investigation that led to Jackson's indictment.

In a related development, the lawyer for Christopher Eric Carter, a key prosecution witness who has been charged in a string of Nevada armed robberies, said Wednesday he has advised the former Jackson bodyguard not to testify at the trial.

Carter's testimony would be important to the prosecution because what he told the grand jury that indicted Jackson last year appears to corroborate the accuser's statement that the singer gave him alcohol, as the indictment alleges.

Cross-examination limited

The brevity of the prosecution's questioning of Katz limited what defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. could ask on cross-examination, which has to be within the scope of the prosecution's direct exam.

In an attempt to draw parallels with the accuser in the Jackson case, Mesereau focused much of his questioning on books and articles by Katz in which the psychologist discusses how abuse victims behave.

Katz also testified about the frequency of false allegations of sexual abuse, saying very few are made by children older than 5.

He said it would be "extremely rare" for preadolescent boys, like Jackson's accuser, to make a false claim because they are "hyper-sensitive" about their sexuality.

He said an absence of physical evidence corroborating a molestation claim is not unusual. "Fondling doesn't leave marks or bruises or semen," he said.

In 1993, Feldman represented the family of another teenage boy who said Jackson molested him. Without admitting guilt, Jackson agreed to a multimillion-dollar settlement to end a civil suit over those charges.

Katz told jurors Wednesday about his involvement in the earlier case, which he portrayed as limited. He said he was hired by Feldman's law firm to review videotape of an interview another psychologist had conducted with Jackson's 1993 accuser and offer his opinion as an expert on child abuse.

The defense has pointed to the common cast of characters in the two cases to support its contention that the latest charges were made up to extract another financial bonanza -- and that the involvement of some of the same people could account for common details in cases a decade apart.

When pressed about his relationship with Feldman, Katz insisted he had little contact with him in the decade between the two cases. "I have no social relationship with him," he said.

Lawyer offers more background

Feldman has not been called to testify in the trial. But the lawyer who referred the mother of Jackson's current accuser to him, William Dickerman, took the stand Wednesday to describe the series of events leading to Feldman's involvement in the case.

Dickerman said he was hired by the mother in February 2003, after the boy, then 13, appeared with Jackson in a controversial television documentary in which they were shown holding hands. She wanted Dickerman to write letters to networks who aired the program demanding that they stop using the boy's image, he said.

The next month, after the family broke off contact with Jackson and left his Neverland Ranch for good, Dickerman said he also began sending letters to Mark Geragos, Jackson's attorney at the time.

Dickerman said he demanded in the letters that Jackson put a stop to what the family described as a campaign of harassment and intimidation, including surveillance of family members and people banging on their door late at night.

He said he also asked for the return of items belonging to the family, including birth certificates, passports and personal property, including the accuser's underwear and his tap shoes.

Dickerman said that as he worked with the family and "learned a lot of things" he decided to refer them to Feldman because "he was the go-to guy with regard to Michael Jackson matters."

Under cross-examination by the defense, Dickerman admitted he had an arrangement with Feldman under which he would share any legal fees generated by a successful civil suit against Jackson.

The defense contends that criminal charges against Jackson are designed to reinforce an eventual civil claim against him by the boy, now 15, and his family. Dickerman discounted such a motive. "I don't anticipate any lawsuit," he said, adding that the boy's mother never asked him to seek money from anyone.

Dickerman conceded that in the letters he wrote to Geragos in the spring of 2003, he never mentioned anything about allegations of child molestation or alcohol consumption, or that the family claimed it had been held against its will at Neverland.

He said he never called police to report any wrongdoing by Jackson. He said he did call the Santa Barbara Sheriff's Department once to check on the progress of the investigation triggered by Katz and Feldman.

Dickerman said he did not see any of the alleged harassment of the accuser's family by Jackson's camp that he mentioned in his letters to Geragos.

Jackson, wearing a dark suit with a light peach vest and a dark peach armband, attended court Wednesday with his parents.

At one point as he was entering the Santa Monica courthouse, he playfully patted one of his bodyguards on the head.

Testimony about plane flight

Testimony resumed Wednesday morning with more questioning of Cynthia Ann Bell, a flight attendant who said she served Jackson wine disguised in a soda can on a private jet flight from Miami to California with the accuser and his family in February 2003.

Bell, who testified Tuesday that she did not see Jackson share alcohol with his accuser or anyone else, described Jackson as intoxicated but not drunk on the flight, explaining that he was just "a lot more relaxed."

She said the accuser was rude and demanding throughout the flight, at one point triggering a food fight by throwing mashed potatoes at Jackson's doctor. "He acted like I was his maid," Bell said, adding that neither Jackson nor the boy's mother stepped in to discipline him.

She said the policy of the charter company that operated the plane, which Jackson often used, was to have wine in soda cans available for him. On Tuesday, Bell testified that Jackson did not direct her to disguise the wine in the soda can.

She also said that during the flight she saw Jackson touching the boy "at times," putting his arm around him. But she said she would not describe what she saw as cuddling.

Jackson was indicted last April by a state grand jury on 10 felony counts for incidents that allegedly occurred in February and March 2003.

The 46-year-old singer is accused of molesting the boy at Neverland, giving him alcohol and conspiring to hold the boy's family captive in 2003.

Jackson has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

CNN's Dree DeClamecy and Stan Wilson contributed to this report.

http://us.cnn.com/2005/LAW/03/30/jackson/index.html

Jolie Rouge · 04-01-2005, 05:49 PM

Attorney: Accuser's family has not asked for lawsuit against Jackson
No trace of accuser in singer's bed, sheriff's deputy testifies
Friday, April 1, 2005

SANTA MARIA, California (CNN) -- An attorney representing the family of the teenage boy at the center of Michael Jackson's child molestation trial testified Friday the family never asked him to file a lawsuit against the pop star.

The testimony by Larry Feldman seemed to support Jackson defense attorneys who contend that the boy's family sought money from the pop star.

Also Friday, an investigator testified that linens seized by police from Jackson's bed failed to yield hair, fibers or DNA linked to the teenager accusing him of child molestation or the accuser's brother.

In Friday testimony, attorney Feldman said the family of the accuser first approached him to investigate allegations and possible legal action against media companies, including ABC, for showing the faces of the minor and his brother without consent in a 2003 documentary.

Later, after the investigation had shifted, Feldman brought in Dr. Stan Katz. A psychologist, Katz helped launch the string of events leading to Jackson's indictment when he reported to police that Jackson's accuser, during a therapy session, said he had been molested by the pop star while staying with him at Neverland Ranch.

When Santa Barbara County District Attorney Tom Sneddon began investigating the allegations, Feldman said, he told the prosecutor he would not file a suit.

During a tense cross-examination of Feldman, defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. established that the boy, now 15, and his brother have until the age of 20 to sue for damages in the case. Additionally, Mesereau established, if Jackson is convicted in criminal court, a conviction in a civil suit -- which could bring a damage award -- is virtually assured.

The connection between Katz, Feldman and Jackson is not new. In 1993, Feldman represented the family of another 13-year-old boy who spent time with Jackson. Feldman referred that boy to Katz, who contacted authorities after the boy said he had been molested.

The 1993 case ended after Jackson, without admitting guilt, agreed to pay the boy and his family a multimillion-dollar settlement. The boy stopped cooperating with authorities, ending a criminal probe into the charges.

Jackson's trial judge has ruled that evidence from the 1993 case can be brought up in Jackson's current trial, raising the possibility of Katz pulling double duty as a witness about both alleged episodes. (More on that ruling)

But the defense also is expected to point to the common cast of characters to bolster its contention that the latest charges were made up to extract another financial bonanza -- and that the involvement of many of the same people could account for common details in cases a decade apart.

Under cross-examination by Mesereau, Feldman repeatedly denied attending a meeting at which defense attorneys say he told CNN's Larry King that the accuser's mother was making up the molestation allegations.

While he was on the stand, tempers appeared to be running short in the courtroom. Feldman seemed testy with both Sneddon and Mesereau, and Santa Barbara Superior Court Judge Rodney Melville, while considering an objection, told Sneddon, "Don't give me that look."

Testing of seized Neverland items
Earlier Friday, the officer who oversaw the November 18, 2003, search of Neverland testified about the test results of items confiscated from Jackson's home.

"We took all bedding," said Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Sgt. Jeff Klapakis, who oversaw the search warrant execution.

Both the accuser and his brother claim they frequently slept in Jackson's bed, and allege that is where the molestation took place.

During cross-examination, Klapakis said authorities did not test bottles and glasses containing alcohol -- found in Jackson's bedroom as well as the home's wine cellar and kitchen -- for fingerprints. Nor did investigators test furniture, boxes, mannequin toys and rails along Jackson's stairwell or his bedroom doors for fingerprints.

Klapakis told defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr., that investigators did test pornographic magazines. The boy's brother testified Jackson showed them the magazines. A fingerprint analyst has testified the prints of Jackson and his accuser were recovered from the same sexually explicit magazine.

Asked on redirect by prosecutors why the glasses and bottles were not tested for prints, Klapakis said, "It didn't enter in the investigation at the time."

Jack Green, president of Affordable Telephone Systems, followed Klapakis to the stand. Green inspected Neverland's telephone system, and testified that Jackson's private telephone line was able to join in with or listen to conversations on any other line throughout the ranch.

Under cross-examination, Green conceded there was nothing unusual about the system, and said that anyone could dial out or call 911 on it.

Jackson was indicted last April by a state grand jury on 10 felony counts for incidents that allegedly occurred in February and March 2003.

The 46-year-old singer is accused of molesting the boy -- now 15 years old -- at Neverland, giving him alcohol and conspiring to hold the boy's family captive in 2003.

Jackson has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

CNN's Stan Wilson and Ted Rowlands contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/04/01/ja...ial/index.html

llbriteyes · 04-01-2005, 07:38 PM

I think I'll hold my opinion until the jury comes back.

Linda

JCshopper · 04-01-2005, 09:19 PM

Hey Jolie, What do you think about this? Just curious... I just don't know what to make of it all. I think that it is possible that he could be innocent. Some people could see someone like him and think he is freakish enough that they could make these allegations and take advantage of that. Everyone, whether they like him or not has to at least acknowlege that he is very bizarre. It would be very easy to equate his strange behavior with a sexual deviance. I think it has been shown over and over again how difficult it is to prove or disprove sexual molestation unless there is absolute physical evidence. If he is guilty of course I hope he pays dearly, no punishment would be too harsh ... but how will they ever figure it out? Scratching my head over this one.

CatrinaF25 · 04-02-2005, 03:13 AM

he is odd. he is wierd but i dont think he did this. I think he does want to act as a CHILD> but i dont think he molisted this child. if he does hell will hold a special place for him and i hope he pays dearly . but i just dont think he did it

Kyla Kym · 04-02-2005, 04:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CatrinaF25

he is odd. he is wierd but i dont think he did this. I think he does want to act as a CHILD> but i dont think he molisted this child. if he does hell will hold a special place for him and i hope he pays dearly . but i just dont think he did it

I don't think he did it either. Especially after watching a show that was true the other day about little people. It was a married little couple that had 3 or 4 children. Anyway their farm looked like something straight out of peter pan complete with life size pirate ships. I thought WOW these people really spoil their children. But as the program progressed we learned that the husband wasn't allowed to be a real kid because he had to have so many surgeries as a child. So he said he is making up for it now that he is a grown man. When he said that the first thing I thought of was M.J. claiming to never have had a childhood. So maybe their is something to some people that can afford to be a child again once they are adults if they missed out on their first childhood.

The sad part to me is, if he is really innocent, then this whole mess is going to change him. He seems like such a caring, loving person. I've seen on TV how most of those stars want to be left alone. He seems to care about people. I truly hope it isn't true.

Jolie Rouge · 04-15-2005, 09:19 PM

Accuser's Mom Admits Earlier Lies
By LINDA DEUTSCH

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (AP) - The mother of Michael Jackson's young accuser was barraged with questions and insinuations on the witness stand Friday as the singer's attorney tried to portray her as a con artist and forced her to admit she had lied under oath twice in an unrelated case.

Attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr.'s biting cross-examination and the witness's long-winded answers that often strayed from the subject prompted Judge Rodney S. Melville to admonish both sides.

Mesereau, attempting to shatter the mother's credibility, focused many of his questions on the woman's lawsuit against a department store. The family received more than $150,000 in 2001 after alleging they were roughed up by JC Penney security guards.

Mesereau noted that in a sworn statement, the woman said she had never been abused by her husband at the time - an important issue, because her alleged injuries may have been caused by such violence. ``You were not telling the truth under oath when you made those statements,'' Mesereau said.

The woman eventually responded, ``This is correct,'' but explained that she lied because she was embarrassed about the abuse.

She also acknowledged being untruthful when she said in the lawsuit that her husband was honest.

Earlier, the witness testified that she gave a poor performance on a videotaped interview in which she praised Jackson, saying she is a ``bad actress.'' Mesereau fired back: ``I think you're a good one.''

The judge chastised Mesereau for the remark and told the woman to refrain from delivering long answers unrelated to attorneys' questions, telling her, ``It's as much your fault.''

Jackson, 46, is accused of molesting a 13-year-old former cancer patient, plying the boy with alcohol, and holding his family captive at his Neverland ranch and elsewhere in February and March 2003 to get them to help rebut a damaging documentary.

Jackson's lawyers have suggested that the child-molestation charges were concocted by the boy's mother in an attempt to shake down Jackson for money.

The mother said Jackson associates gave her a precise script to follow in the rebuttal video but later told her she had strayed too far from it, leading to the comments on her acting skills.

The woman testified that almost everything on the video - even breaks where the boy complains about his seat and the family laughs at jokes - was scripted by Jackson aides. She said the only departure from the script was when she discussed God, cancer and child welfare workers.

At one point on the tape, the boy speaks at great length about the agonies of undergoing cancer treatment. ``Do you believe what (he) was saying was the truth or not?'' Mesereau asked the boy's mother. ``I believe what he was saying was according to a script,'' she said.

The woman suggested that she met with one of Jackson's associates 10 times at Neverland to discuss what she would say on the video. Mesereau noted that she had never said this before in interviews with police or prosecutors, and suggested she was trying to enhance her story.

Asked about a report she made against her ex-husband accusing him of molesting her daughter, the woman refused to answer the question directly and instead turned to the jury and said, ``No, he's wrong.'' But ultimately, she agreed she had made such a report.

Earlier in the day, prosecutors concluded their questioning of the woman by showing jurors videotapes found in a private investigator's office to demonstrate that Jackson associates had closely monitored the boy's family while he, his mother and siblings were allegedly being held captive by Jackson at Neverland.

Associated Press writer Tim Molloy contributed to this report.

04/15/05 18:19

http://channels.netscape.com/ns/news...p_news_jackson

Jolie Rouge · 04-18-2005, 03:31 PM

Jackson Accuser's Mom Refuses to Answer
By TIM MOLLOY

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (AP) - The mother of Michael Jackson's young accuser cited attorney-client privilege Monday in refusing to say whether she was represented by a lawyer at a time she and her children were allegedly held captive by the pop star.

Resuming a tough cross-examination that began last week, Jackson attorney Thomas Mesereau asked the woman if she had been represented by lawyer Michael Manning from 2001 through 2004 on issues involving her divorce.

The woman said Manning had helped her on several issues involving the divorce. She added that Manning worked for her for free and that as a result she was one of his low-priority clients. Superior Court Judge Rodney S. Melville ordered the latter comments stricken from the record. When Mesereau asked the woman if Manning was her attorney at the time of the alleged captivity, the woman asked, ``Is that attorney-client privilege?''

Mesereau said he would drop the question if she was citing her privilege, and she said she was doing so.

Jackson, 46, is accused of molesting one of the woman's sons, plying the boy with alcohol, and holding his family captive in February and March 2003 to get them to help rebut the ``Living With Michael Jackson'' documentary in which Jackson said he allowed children to sleep in his bed, a practice he called innocent. The woman alleges that Jackson and his associates held her family captive, shuttling them between locations until they made a rebuttal video in which they praised Jackson.

Mesereau also asked the woman about her reasons for mentioning Jackson, Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant and Los Angeles TV weather forecaster Fritz Coleman in an interview with police involving domestic abuse allegations against her former husband. She said her former husband falsely accused her of having sex with Jackson, Bryant and Coleman. She said she gave investigators their names so they could contact them and verify that the ex-husband's claims were not true.

Mesereau noted that the police report did not include any mention of alleged false claims by her ex-husband that she was having sex with celebrities. ``I don't think it was considered a crime,'' she said.

Jackson's attorneys contend the woman is the mastermind of a scheme to get money from the singer by having her son falsely accuse him of molestation. She testified last week, however, that she has no plans to sue him.

But last week she also admitted under Mesereau's questioning that she twice lied under oath in a lawsuit against department store J.C. Penney.

The family received a settlement of more than $150,000 after alleging that guards beat them. But the woman acknowledged she lied when she testified in the case that her then-husband was an honest person and that he had never beaten her.

The woman said she asked her attorneys to correct her testimony after her husband was arrested, accused of domestic abuse. She said she felt ``liberated'' to change the record but that her attorneys never did.

On Friday, Mesereau played the rebuttal video for the fourth time in the trial. It includes the woman and her children repeatedly calling Jackson a father figure. Mesereau asked if the woman was lying when she made the comments, and she said the entire video was scripted by Jackson's associates. ``I was acting,'' she testified.

The woman testified that Jackson's associates told her the family had to stay with them because ``killers'' wanted to hurt the family. She said she was never told who the killers were.

The prosecution has introduced video and audio tapes to corroborate her account.

On one recorded phone call, a Jackson associate was heard telling her the family might be in danger because of the broadcast of the ``Living With Michael Jackson'' documentary.

04/18/05 15:51

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/sto...07.htm&sc=1403

Jolie Rouge · 04-18-2005, 10:58 PM

Accuser's Mom Says Jackson Fooled World
By LINDA DEUTSCH

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (AP) - The mother of Michael Jackson's accuser lashed out at the pop star from the witness stand Monday, declaring that Jackson ``really didn't care about children, he cared about what he was doing with children.''

The woman resisted answering questions by defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. and began her fourth day on the witness stand by making speeches to the jury.

She looked at Jackson across the courtroom and said: ``He managed to fool the world. Now, because of this criminal case, people know who he really is.''

Jackson is accused of molesting one of the woman's sons - a teenage cancer patient - in February or March 2003, giving the boy alcohol and conspiring to hold the boy's family captive to get them to rebut a TV documentary about the singer.

During another combative day on the stand, the woman admitted that she once told sheriff's deputies she feared Jackson had a plan for her and her family to disappear from his Neverland ranch in a hot air balloon.

However, she accused Mesereau of taking the comment out of context. ``I told police that (Jackson associates) had many ways to make us disappear,'' she said.

``And someone mentioned to you a hot air balloon?'' Mesereau asked.

``That was one of the ways,'' she said.

The mother also denied repeatedly that Jackson or anyone associated with him had tried to help her and her family when her son was stricken with cancer.

Asked whether Jackson arranged a blood drive at his Neverland ranch, she said, ``I was responsible for that.'' She then launched into an explanation about how the hospital would provide a bloodmobile anywhere she could arrange such an event.

``And Mr. Jackson allowed you to use the ranch for the blood drive?'' asked Mesereau.

``Yes, this is correct,'' the woman said. But she added, ``He wasn't the only one. Many church groups gathered.''

Mesereau also elicited testimony that the woman received checks for $20,000 and deposited them in her mother's bank account. But she said she could not remember how any of the money had been used for her son.

She also said she opened a bank account in which people could deposit money for her son's benefit.

``Did you withdraw thousands of dollars from that account?'' Mesereau asked.

``Yes,'' said the woman.

``And was any of that money for medical expenses?'' the attorney asked.

``No,'' she said.

She denied that she misled a reporter for a local newspaper into writing a story saying the family was poverty-stricken and was paying $12,000 for each chemotherapy treatment the boy received. The story included an address to send contributions.

She said that the $12,000 figure was a typographical error and that she meant $1,200. But she acknowledged ultimately that the family was paying for nothing because the father's health insurance covered the boy's treatment.

Mesereau led her through questions and answers involving her relationship with comedian Chris Tucker and his girlfriend Aja, and she denied that the family solicited help, money or any other gifts from Tucker. She acknowledged that Tucker once gave the family a car, but she said she never asked him to do that and asserted that he only did it because he had gotten his girlfriend a car and needed to make room for it.

Mesereau pressed her on whether she made any attempts to get help during the family's alleged period of captivity. ``Did you complain to anyone in the building that crimes were being committed against you and your family?'' Mesereau asked.

``No, but I am now,'' she said.

Mesereau also noted that the woman was able to telephone comedian Louise Palanker during the alleged captivity. ``If you could call (Palanker), why couldn't you call police?'' Mesereau said.

``I couldn't. I was hoping she could,'' the woman responded.

Mesereau then asked, ``You didn't call 911?''

``I have now,'' the woman said.

Associated Press Writer Tim Molloy contributed to this report.

04/18/05 22:24

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/sto...41.htm&sc=1403