Transcript of “Frozen in Time: A Riveting Behind-the-Scenes View of the Michael Jackson Cases”, Part 4. RON ZONEN

Here is part 4 of the series, featuring Sneddon’s LITERAL partner in crime Ron Zonen. The video of Zonen, Mesereau, and the Q&A session is below:

 

 

Transcript of “Frozen in Time: A Riveting Behind-the-Scenes View of the Michael Jackson Cases”, Part 4

Ron Zonen: Carl, I met “Billie Jean” too.  She called me as well. Actually, about 10 “Billie Jeans” called me throughout the trial, all professing to be the mother of Michael Jackson’s child, and I actually continue to get those phone calls, the most recent from about 6 months ago from an attorney in Louisiana who is representing a woman who is quite convinced that her child is Michael Jackson’s child. And he now is rather eager to become involved in the resolution of Michael Jackson’s estate.  I told him it’s not a terrible problem to resolve, we do have Mr. Jackson’s DNA on file at the department of justice and it’s a question of getting a simple subpoena to be able to get the form the describes the DNA profile, and you can go ahead and have your clients child DNA’d, and that’s a verb nowadays! (Laughter!).  And that would resolve the issue, and I never heard another word from him.  I was somewhat skeptical about the allegations all along.  I had another lawyer who came to me and was quite convinced, during the course of the trial, that his client gave birth as well to Michael Jackson’s surrogate child, and the child was taken away from the mother quite forcefully and inappropriately, and he was commencing a lawsuit about that, and felt that we should get involved in that investigation as well.  We had those calls come in on a fairly regularly basis, we would get them often, and they were detailed.  Fortunately, we knew that a lot of the activity that Michael Jackson was involved in was, for the most part, involved at either his condo in Los Angeles, his house on Hayvenhurst, or Neverland.  And we had a pretty good understanding of the layout of those 3 locations.  And to that extent when people called and reported a variety of different instances with Michael Jackson, the first thing we were able to do was ask “Where did it occur?”, and then we would say “Describe for us that particular location.”  And we could discredit fairly quickly those people who were making false claims, and there were many of them that came along during at that time.

We have a relatively short window of opportunity to be able to talk about some of the events that led up to the prosecution, and then I assume that we’ll have a few moments to talk about the trial as well.  But to the extent that our office, the District Attorney’s office in Santa Barbara, became involved, let me give you just a little bit of background.  I’m going to talk to you a little bit about the young man today, about Gavin today, because it’s interesting what his life has turned out to be, now 6 years after the trial. Gavin was one of, at that time, 3 siblings. He and his mother and his father lived in a studio apartment in east Los Angeles, one room that had been neatly partitioned with bedsheets so that each group of them within the family had some measure of privacy.  Gavin’s father was an extraordinary violent man, who on a fairly regular basis would administer violence not just upon his wife Janet, the mother of his 3 children, but upon the children as well.  Mostly, though, reserved for his wife. They were married for over 15 years before the police finally came along and took the police finally came along and took the father out of the household.  Gavin was 12 years old at the time, and never saw his father again after that.  When Gavin was about 10 years old, he was diagnosed with cancer, and it was a vile cancer.  It was a cancer that invaded his entire insides. There was a tumor that was about 10 pounds in dimension.  This was a 10-year-old child, and the tumor was about 1/10^th of his body weight, or more.  The cancer had spread into his lungs, and he was at death’s door.  At one point doctors had a conversation with his parents in the hospital, and they thought that he was asleep. And they essentially said that, to the extent of Gavin’s remembers that conversation, they essentially said that “you should go ahead and start preparing for a funeral.  He’s not going to survive longer than another couple of weeks.” Gavin did survive.  It was over a year of very intense, adult level radiation treatment, but he actually managed to beat the cancer, and today he’s actually doing quite well.  He’s 20 years old.  During that time, there were a number of different celebrities who were contacted by people who knew Gavin.  They knew that he had been taking classes at the Laugh Factory at Sunset, Jamie Masada’s operation. He was taking classes there on Stand-Up Comedy, actually taught by a number of different comedians, including one who is present in this audience today.  After Gavin became very sick and became hospitalized and appeared to everybody that he wasn’t going to survive, a number of comedians were introduced to him.  People who had actually worked with him as his mentor, that included George Lopez, Jay Leno, and a few other names that you know.  People who you often watched on television when he was so sick that he couldn’t leave the clean room  that he was in for over  a year, except to go to the hospital.  Night and day were no longer of any no relevance to him, so he often watched the comedians on late night television, and really developed a fondness for them.  He also developed a fondness for Michael Jackson, and when asked if there was anybody that he hasn’t yet met, and again he was at death’s door, for somebody that he would want to meet, and he said “Michael Jackson”, and somehow that arrangement was made.  We don’t really know exactly who the link was.  We know a lot of a couple different people who have taken credit for it.  We don’t know both of them were responsible, if it just happened.

Michael Jackson at that time did reach out to people who were ill, particularly kids who were ill and extend his largess and his kindness to them on a regular basis.  He contacted Gavin, and his first conversation was many hours on the telephone, well into the late hours of the morning. Both Gavin and Michael Jackson at that time were quite nocturnal, they were up all night.  Gavin because he couldn’t leave the room, and night and day didn’t have any relevance.  And Michael Jackson because he was nocturnal!  He liked being up at nighttime and not outside during the day.  Being in the direct sun was a particular problem given the skin condition that he had.  But Gavin was invited up to Neverland, and Michael Jackson sent a limousine to pick them up, and his mother required that the two other siblings can go because they all went places together.  And the first time they went with the mother and the father, and thereafter the mother didn’t go back again for quite some period of time. Over the next year Gavin actually survived his cancer, he got better, and today I believe he is completely cured of it.  He had one kidney that was removed, and the second kidney that functions at less than capacity, but that hasn’t stopped him.  He’s very active in sports, and has played high school football, and has pursued a very normal life since that time.  After he was healed, and he was not going back to Neverland.  He was healed, and he was going back to school, and he was a normal child at 12 years old, he was invited back to Neverland, along with his siblings, his brother and sister, and his father was already out of the picture at his point.  He was invited back to Neverland because Michel Jackson, who was not doing well at that time either financially or career-wise, and had not released any significant music at that time, and was horribly in debt to the tunes of what we believed to the tunes of what we believed to be hundreds of millions of dollars, had invited in a documentary maker named Martin Bashir to do a documentary.  Gavin was invited back to the ranch because while Martin Bashir was there and doing this documentary and covering Michael Jackson and everything that was Michael Jackson and including the trips to Las Vegas, and the spending sprees, and the travels to Germany, and the baby over the balcony, and all that was Michael Jackson both good and bad during that period of time.  Martin Bashir was there at exactly the time that these children arrived at Neverland.  They were brought back there because Michael Jackson was very proud at the kindness that he had extended to this family and this very horribly sick and impoverished family, this very sick child who had revered much to Michael Jackson’s credit, as he puts it.  He had recovered from this horrible cancer. While he was there, there was a scene in this documentary that was filmed by Martin Bashir of Gavin sitting on a couch next to Michael Jackson, with his hand in Michael Jackson’s hand, and his head resting on Michael Jackson’s shoulder.  And Michael Jackson is describing how these kids stay with him not just in his house, not just in his room, but in his bed.  And that began a conversation with Martin Bashir, who is no idiot, who immediately decides that there is something remiss here, and starts questioning him about the propriety about children sharing his bed, who were special friends with Michael Jackson, all boys, all between the ages of 10 and no older than 13.  By 13 they were generally out of the picture, and generally not younger than 10. But this whole area was covered at length by Martin Bashir and ended up in the documentary.

The documentary came out, and when it came out it featured this entire conversation with Gavin, and with Michael Jackson sitting one next to another, Gavin juxtaposed to Michael Jackson, his head on his shoulders, hand in Michael Jackson’s hand, talking about them sharing a bed for a prolonged period of time of which Michael Jackson professed was a perfectly normal and perfectly innocent activity.  Gavin went back to school within a few days after that and was horribly tormented by all the other kids who had been in the school and had seen that. Of course the understanding of what had meant to Gavin was something that would be pretty obvious to all of you.  And that is exactly what he was confronted with by all the other children.  Immediately as this was happening, and even before that, the family was invited back to Neverland, and once back at Neverland they stayed at Neverland in what was, we believed, an effort by Michael Jackson’s handlers to keep this entire family away from the press.  Why keep them away from the press? Because they wanted to control the information that was coming out, and because the mother of the child, frankly, was uncontrollable.  She was uncontrollable. She was somewhat, frankly, unstable. She was a person who could say or do anything at any particular time.  She was a very difficult person for anyone to control.  We dealt with significant issues with her during the course of the trial, and of course she was the principal feature for the defense. Essentially, when the trial came along that it was really nothing more than a shakedown in an effort to extort money.  In fact, we of course were of the belief that no such thing happened, and as I describe a little bit more about how these things unfolded, and then you’ll be able to make your own decisions one way or another. While at Neverland for this period of time, this was the period of time that the boys ended up staying at Michael Jackson’s house, in Michael Jackson’s room.  For a long period of time, there was a trip to Florida right before there was an effort by Michael Jackson’s handlers to hold a press conference so that the kids could actually address the press and explain that nothing had happened during this period of time.  And then back at Neverland for a period of a number of weeks while the mother was there but in an entirely different guest cottage.  The kids would be inside the house, inside his room, and to get inside his room you have to go through a locked door, and then you have to go through a combination lock in an entry way to his private room, and then you pass through a security system that sounds chimes and alarms as you go through, and then up the stairs where the bedroom was.  The kids had the combination to that lock, and they came and went.  By kids I mean the two boys and not their sister.  The sister lived in the guest quarters and the mother lived in the guest quarters.  The boys came and went inside of his room.

During that period of time there was an effort by Michael Jackson’s handlers to move the whole family to Brazil.  He actually withdrew the children from school, they moved the entire family out of their studio apartment in east LA. They put all of their belongings into a storage facility where they actually didn’t know where it was.  They got Visas for them.  They got passports for them.  They got one-way tickets for them.  All of which we had, and all of which we took into evidence.  And essentially they were going to move them to Brazil for an undisclosed period of time, which simply could have been indefinite.  The mother did not want to go to Brazil, and eventually she left Neverland, got her kids and brought them out of Neverland, and she then contacted an attorney by the name of Dickerman.  Why did she contact Dickerman? Because her possessions were some place other than in her possession.  She didn’t know where any of her possessions were.  Any of her property, her clothing, her furniture, to the extent that she had it.  Again, she lived in a studio apartment.   She had no idea where any of her possessions were.  She went to Dickerman, who was a friend of Jamie Masada.  That was the recommendation.  The second thing that she wanted of Mr. Dickerman was that her children should not be on television anymore in this documentary.  There was never any permission that was given by her.  At this point she was the sole custodian of the children. The father was long removed from the scene.  There was restraining orders who kept them from that family.  She goes in to see Mr. Dickerman.  She has no knowledge of anything inappropriate having happened at Neverland, other than the presence of her children in the documentary that she objected to. She goes to Dickerman, and Dickerman sees these two young boys, and Dickerman has some knowledge of what happened in 1993, and he immediately contacts Larry Feldman.  And they go to Larry Feldman. Dickerman has no personal information that anything inappropriate happened while they were at Neverland, but has some sense that maybe something more needs to be addressed on this.  Dickerman knows what happened with Larry Feldman in 1993 with that particular lawsuit. And he brings the whole family to Larry Feldman. Larry Feldman looks at Gavin, who at this point is about 12 years old, almost 13 I believe, and sees in Gavin a very strong resemblance to the child from 1993.  They’re the same age, roughly the same size, roughly the same coloring.  You could look at pictures of the two of them, along with two other children who also had a very close intimate relationship with Michael Jackson years prior.  You look at the photographs of all of them together, and at times it’s hard to distinguish one photograph from another.  They all bear very much the same resemblance.  Larry Feldman immediately brings in Stan Katz.  Stan Katz is a psychologist who specializes in child sexual abuse. Stan Katz interviews both of the boys, and at that point there was a disclosure of child sexual abuse.  It was to Stan Katz. Stan Katz immediately notified Child Protective Services in Los Angeles County, who notified Child Protective Services and the Sheriff’s Office in Santa Barbara County, and herego this investigation became active.  At the time the District Attorney in Santa Barbara was Tom Sneddon, who is now retired from that office, now held by Joyce Dovely.  Tom Sneddon was the District Attorney at the time in 1993, and was involved in that investigation.  He had some insight and understanding of the entirety of the case that involved Larry’s client back then.  So he had a pretty good understanding of what was going on. Sheriff’s office commenced an investigation that ultimately led to a search of the property.

At the search of the property they discovered a number of things that were of interest to that prosecution, including a lot of the pornography that Michael Jackson kept at his residence, and particularly in his bedroom.  It was all seized and from that became the largest effort that Santa Barbara has ever had in tracking down and identifying fingerprints on hundreds of magazines, each individual page, each revealing dozens and dozens of fingerprints, but many of those fingerprints ultimately confirmed to be fingerprints of Gavin and Gavin’s brother. Material that they said was shown to them repeatedly was shown to them by Michael Jackson at his house.  As well there was Vodka bottle, a number of different bottles of alcoholic beverages that was consistent with what the kids had said had been served to them at Neverland, in particularly at Michael Jackson’s residence. That was the search; the search eventually led a Grand Jury hearing.  Why a Grand Jury hearing?  Who has participated in a Grand Jury hearing? We have a couple of hands up.  We have a tradition in Santa Barbara.  I can’t speak to other counties, but we have a tradition for high profile cases.  Our little community of Santa Barbara. We don’t go to Santa Barbara because we want to be high profile lawyers.  We go to Santa Barbara because we want to golf! Or be on the beach! It’s a beautiful, angelic community, it’s very nice, and none of us were necessarily accustomed to the kind of profile celebrity status that was going to be visited upon us in the course of that trial.  We made the decision to go to the Grand Jury because we felt it was appropriate, not just for that case, but all celebrity cases, all high profile cases, it’s just kind of an American tradition that the Grand Jury makes the decision. And in this particular case we also had the advantage of being able to do it in secret, hopefully keeping the transcript confidential and sealed, such that everybody would be protected from the content of that hearing from going public before we actually impaneled the jury.  We felt it would be in Mr. Jackson’s benefit.  We felt it would be in our benefit. That it would be the right thing to be able to do. We also felt that if we keep all of the press, and by now it was something I wasn’t familiar with, the press with trucks everywhere as far as you could see.  And we’d step out and they’d follow us. Just like on television when you, with the camera following you as you walk across the street on your way to court, firing questions, and of course at that point we had a gag order, so we couldn’t answer anything anyway, so there’s nothing that we could say.  But that was the type of environment that we had.

We looked for a place to hold the Grand Jury hearing where there wouldn’t be anybody hanging around. And we did it at the Armory.  We did at the firing range for the Sheriff’s Office, which happens to be hundreds and hundreds of acres that secluded from main roads.  The jury would assemble each day in a different location in Santa Barbara in a parking lot, that they would told the night before, so that no press would be there.  It was an Albertson’s parking lot, it was Sears’ parking lot, it was something like that.  Earl Warren’s Showgrounds up there.  One of those locations, the van would then scoop up all of the Grand Jurors.  They would take them to the armory, where they sat in a room which we had converted to a Grand Jury hearing. And for the next 3 weeks we put on I think around 30 witnesses for the Grand Jury, including all 3 of the children and the mother as well, as problematic as that was and continued to be. We did get an indictment at that point.  We made the decision to file it in Santa Maria because, as Judge Melville says, “What happens north of the mountains stays north of the mountains”.  And we felt that would be the appropriate forum. These events took place in Santa Ynez, and that is part of North County officially.  Any other crime that occurs in Santa Ynez would be prosecuted in Santa Maria, and that’s where it was. While our expectation as well is that it would have been assigned to the then most senior judge in Santa Maria, and that would have been Judge Melville, and that was our preference as well.  And that was how that ended.

To deal with the trial itself, because at this point as we’re getting close to the start of trial, we had accumulated something close to 100,000 pages of discovery.  Now Mesereau is going to yell and scream because he only got 50,000 of those, but he actually got the whole thing!  It was all turned over during the course of the trial.  So the three lawyers from our office who would be trying the case lived in Santa Barbara, and decided that we needed to rent a place in Santa Maria, so we rented a house up in Orchid.  Orchid is a very small, bedroom community in Santa Maria, 8 miles south of the courthouse.  I believe that’s actually where Judge Melville lived, and a lot of the attorneys from our office who worked up there lived there as well.  We rented a house, and one of the children of one of the attorneys working on the case ended up nicknaming the house “The H.O.P.”, the House of Prosecution.  The schedule we were on, 8am in the morning until 2pm in the afternoon actually worked quite well for us because it gave us from 2:30pm until we finally retired at the end of the day, to be able to deal with everything. It was our office.  It’s where we stored all of our material, all of our reports, where we set up the computer system. We had no way of bringing in all of the reports of the case into the trial, after the trial had started.  We essentially would put together notebooks every night for the next day as to which witnesses would be on the stand, or once the defense case began that we would be cross-examining.

I thought our relationship with the defense was fairly good.  I mean, there were moments of contentiousness as you can imagine, but we were very good about keeping them informed as to who we would be coming, and they were very good at keeping us very informed about who they would be calling in.  And that’s how we were able to make it through the trial, ultimately.  I think we’re going to have   more of a discussion about jury selection, so I think we’ll probably be going more into the aspects of the trial at a later time, but in terms of the issue of the publicity, we did get a request into the court for a gag order, and that request was granted for the gag order.  Yes, it was true that Tom Sneddon held a press conference, and I’ve watched that press conference with many other people.  At that time I was around the world.  I watched it from the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, where I happened to be, and I was sitting there and thinking it was happening “OK, my life is going to change dramatically at this point”.  I knew about it, but hadn’t told anybody, including all of my family.  We kept it as much of a secret as we possibly could. After that had happened, as Judge Melville points out, Mark Geragos was on Larry King many times a week, and continually talking about the family of grifters that were plaguing his client for an obvious shakedown, and the revenge factor by Tom Sneddon, given the fact that he was not able to prosecute Michael Jackson in 1993.

Now, let me comment on 2 things at the moment as I conclude because I told you I was going to talk to you a little bit about Gavin today.  This was a child who grew up in one room.  The first 10 years of his life were spent in one room with 5 other family members.  He was the victim of a horribly abusive father, and a witness to horribly abusive domestic violence.  He was a victim of cancer that almost killed him.  Before he was 12 years old he endured all of that, and then watching his father being taken away.  He was a rather extraordinary kid.  And then he met Michael Jackson, and we believed was molested by Michael Jackson, and subjected to a horrible ordeal of a trial. At age 15 he stood on the witness stand, took an oath, and sat down and answered questions for hours.  Among the questions, of course, were detailed questions of sexual activities by an international superstar. We lost the case.  He was found not guilty.  We had to explain that to Gavin, what that meant, and what that would likely mean to his life from this point on.  They moved to another location, he used a different name.  He finished high school.  He was outed while he was in high school.  One of Michael Jackson’s fans discovered where he was, and fixed the computer in such a way that all of the MySpace for students at that school, would immediately go directly to his new website, this person which identified Gavin by his photograph, as the person involved in the most uncomplimentary ways possible!

Where is he today?  He’s twenty years old.  He’s a 3^rd year student at a very prominent university on the east coast.  I’m not going to mention the name of the school, but anyone who would like to know come see me, I’ll tell you. He’s an Honor student who has a 3.5 GPA, and a double major in Philosophy and History, and he’s planning on going to Law School! Some of you will agree with that, and some of you won’t.  He’s a deeply religious young man, in a relationship with a young woman, for about 2 years, the daughter of a minister.  He attends church on a regular basis.  He doesn’t drink, doesn’t do drugs.  He’s delightful in his presentation.  I spent time with him only a month ago. And he’s really doing remarkable well.  He has never asked for or taken a penny from anybody about any of the activity of this case.  Never. There are standing offers from the press for his story for enough money that would cover his tuition, which is considerable, never mind that he’s on a 50% scholarship. But he has never taken a penny from anybody, and no intention of doing so. He’s accruing debt like college kids do today, but he’s doing just fine.  I assume that we’ll have more questions coming up about jury selection, and the trial, and I’ll be happy to answer them at that time.

Seth Hufstedler: Thank you Ron.  We appreciate that.  I want to thank you so much for coming because it isn’t often that you get invited to talk about a case that you didn’t win.  And if you talk about it, you don’t talk about it very much.  So it’s very helpful, and very direct and straightforward, and we appreciate it.  Now one thing that I should say is that you undoubtedly know that our next speaker is really one of the most prominent criminal defense lawyers in the country, and has dealt with so many of these cases, and I’m just so astounded, and I apologize Tom that you’ve been sitting her for an hour and a half, two hours, and you haven’t had a chance to say a word!  Now that’s a terrible thing to impose upon an effective lawyer! But we do appreciate you coming, and the podium is yours.

Analyzing Ron Zonen’s Commentary:

1.  “most recent from about 6 months ago from an attorney in Louisiana who is representing a woman who is quite convinced that her child is Michael Jackson’s child.”  I’m sure that the “attorney” (and I use that term very loosely here) from the state of Louisiana who is “representing” this nutcase is probably the same attorney from Louisiana (New Orleans, to be exact) who ”represented” Joseph Bartucci Jr., who sued MJ in 2004, claiming that kidnapped and driven to California by unknown assailants on  May 19^th,  1984!  When he arrived in California, MJ not only molested him,  but held him at gunpoint and cut him with steel wire and a razor blade!

Oh, and of course he immediately suffered amnesia and forgot about all of this until 2004! The sheer lunacy of this claim comes from the fact that MJ was rehearsing for the Victory Tour and traveling and forth to the White House to meet President Reagan during that time period shortly before and after May 19^th, 1984!

Here’s a little background on Bartucci:  he is a serial litigator!  He has been involved in 18 civil lawsuits in the last 17 years, including allegations of sexual abuse by a minister!  Quick! Somebody call SNAP or Road to Recovery! I’m sure they’ll be glad to defend his case!

For more info on Bartucii and other “phantom victims” of MJ, read this post

2. “We had those calls come in on a fairly regularly basis, we would get them often, and they were detailed.” Gee Zonen, what do you expect?  You and Sneddon put out a press release asking for victims of MJ to “come forward with information”!  Have you ever heard of the saying “be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it?”     Here is something to think about: if Sneddon and Co. have to “solicit” for additional victims, then that obviously shows a weakness in their case!  (This topic was addressed in this MJEOL Bullet.) If they had all of this “solid evidence” after their 5 month investigation (June 2003-November 2003), then why did they need to ask for victims to come forward?  Wouldn’t they come on their own?  Do you think actor Todd Bridges would have to be asked or bribed to come  forward if he or his son were abused?

And while we’re on this topic, why did Sneddon wait until December to file charges, even though MJ was arrested on November 21^st?  Could it be that he was hoping another credible  “victim” would show up and bolster his case, and allow him to add more charges?

3. “Gavin’s father was an extraordinary violent man, who on a fairly regular basis would administer violence not just upon his wife Janet, the mother of his 3 children, but upon the children as well.  Mostly, though, reserved for his wife.” To call David Arvizo “extraordinary violent” man would be an understatement!  He physically abused his wife and kids, and in fact it was his abuse of Janet that was the catalyst for her shakedown of JC Penney in 1998!  A week after she was arrested, David beat her so severely that she had bruises and welts all over her body, and she was photographed after this event occurred.  She then claimed that the security guards at JC Penney were the ones who inflicted those injuries on her.

But Janet was no angel herself!  According to an interview that David Arvizo conducted with one of  Mesereau’s private investigators, he recalled how their daughter Davellin said that Janet once held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her and her brothers (on page 13), and a female cousin of Janet who claimed that Janet had sexually and physically abused her when she was between 8 and 10 years old (on page 20.)

4. “We don’t really know exactly who the link was.  We know a lot of a couple different people who have taken credit for it.  We don’t know both of them were responsible, if it just happened.” Although there have been many variations on how exactly Gavin was introduced to MJ, whether it was through the Make-A-Wish foundation or Jamie Masada (the owner of the comedy club that support Gavin through his illness).

The media assumed that it was Masada who introduced Gavin to MJ, and thus Masada took advantage of his connection to the case to get some much-needed publicity for himself and his club.  As usual, the media didn’t veryif their story, but fortunately Geraldo Rivera called him out on his lies!  On his television show, Rivera asked him the tough questions; mainly “Have you ever met Michael Jackson?”, and Masada was forced to ‘fess up!  Here is an excerpt from a MJEOL bullet:

Jamie Masada is the man who claims to have introduced the accuser to Michael Jackson. Masada has also allowed other reporters to assume and imply to their audiences that he had a friendship with Jackson. That friendship, it turns out, is non-existent. Rivera asked Masada if he’s ever even met Jackson and Masada admitted that he has not. What is even more unbelievable is that Rivera may be the only interviewer that even asked whether or not Masada knows Jackson. This is highly important information because Masada has been elevated to the status of a “friend-of-Jackson’s-who-feels-betrayed” by the media. His story has been run on news programs and papers all around the world under the guise of being a Jackson insider. Rivera also confronted Masada about his claims that he introduced Jackson to the accuser. Rivera, who spoke directly with Jackson via telephone Feb 7, says that Jackson was in fact introduced to this accuser through the Make-A-Wish foundation.

Unfortunately, Geraldo was wrong on his assertion that it was the Make-A-Wish foundation, as they strongly denied that they introduced Gavin to MJ  in this November 2003 press release.  The person who arranged Gavin’s first visit to Neverland was actress Vernee Watson-Johnson!  She also testified that she taught Gavin during an acting session at the LA Academy of Fine Arts, and the was very suspicious of Janet Arvizo after she demanded that any money donated to her go straight into her personal bank account, instead of a special count.

What does it say about Sneddon and Zonen’s competance if they don’t even know who was responsible for introducing Gavin to MJ?

5. “While he was there, there was a scene in this documentary that was filmed by Martin Bashir of Gavin sitting on a couch next to Michael Jackson, with his hand in Michael Jackson’s hand, and his head resting on Michael Jackson’s shoulder.  And Michael Jackson is describing how these kids stay with him not just in his house, not just in his room, but in his bed.  And that began a conversation with Martin Bashir….” This is the scene that literally destroyed Michael Jackson’s world!  For years, people have wondered why on earth MJ would allow this scene to transpire, knowing that he had been falsely accused of molestation in 1993, and knowing that being seen holding hands with a young boy couldn’t do anything except bring negative press!  But that’s the problem!  MJ didn’t know that the scene would transpire the way it did!  The purpose of that scene was to discuss all of the good things that MJ did for Gavin, but prior to the start of the interview, Martin Bashir told Gavin to hold hands with MJ and place his head on MJ’s shoulder!  He then told his cameraman to zoom-in on them holding hands, and then when the interview started he ambushed them into discussing their sleeping arrangements! And of course there was no way that Bashir was going to edit this of the documentary, and this scene left an indelible mark on MJ’s reputation, and lead to his conviction in the court of public opinion.

Aphrodite Jones confirmed this in interviews she did earlier this year, and the link to those interviews can be found in this article, and this article.

6. “Martin Bashir, who is no idiot, who immediately decides that there is something remiss here, and starts questioning him about the propriety about children sharing his bed, who were special friends with Michael Jackson, all boys, all between the ages of 10 and no older than 13.  By 13 they were generally out of the picture, and generally not younger than 10.” Well Zonen, if MJ’s special friends were “out of the picture” by the time they reached 13, then why did Brett Barnes, Macauly Culkin, and Wade Robson testify on MJ’s behalf? Why did Robson perform a dance tribute to MJ, and issue a statement after his death? Why did they continue to keep in touch with MJ and visit Neverland throughout their adolescence?  Why did “Dave Dave” speak at MJ’s funeral if he was “dumped” by MJ?  Why did MJ maintain a friendship with Ryan White until he died at the age of 18? That is one of the biggest lies that has been perpetuated by the media.  MJ did not just hang out with young boys; he befriended young girls, teenagers, and adults!  In fact, two girls that vouched for MJ are Nisha Kataria (an aspiring singer who MJ mentored) and Allison V. Smith, who spoke with Ian Halperin for his book “Unmasked”.  Here’s an excerpt:

According to Lennon, Jackson was very shy around girls, like an “awkward teenage.”  But every once in a while, he would hit it off with one and would invite her to his home for sleepovers.

During the course of my investigation, I found four of these girls.  One of them, Allison V. Smith, is now a world-renowned photographer who has shot photos for The New York Times, Esquire, and The New Yorker, among others.  She is also an heiress to the Neiman Marcus luxury department store fortune as the granddaughter of the late retail legend, Stanley Marcus.

“During the trial, they kept talking about all the boys who slept in his bed.  Well, I’m a girl ad I slept in his bed when I was a kid.  The prosecutor must know that there were girls around, but he never mentioned it”, she says, adding that her friendship with Jackson was “a lot of fun” but that she doesn’t like talking about it publicl.y.

“I was tempted to offer myself up as a defense witness,” she recalls, “but I didn’t relish the media circus.”

Here is Robson’s dance tribute to MJ:

7. “Essentially, when the trial came along that it was really nothing more than a shakedown in an effort to extort money.  In fact, we of course were of the belief that no such thing happened, and as I describe a little bit more about how these things unfolded, and then you’ll be able to make your own decisions one way or another.” This is a quote that unfortunately was taken of context.  William Wagener interviewed a law professor who attended and mistakenly thought that Zonen was implying that  the case really was a shakedown, when in fact he said that was the defense’s theory.

And as for Zonen’s suggestion that we should “make our own decisions one way or another”, I would say to him “Yes Zonen, we have made our own decisions, instead of letting you and media spoon-feed us, and we know that MJ was innocent, and your case was nothing but malicious prosecution, for which you and Sneddon should be jailed!”

8. “Dickerman has no personal information that anything inappropriate happened while they were at Neverland, but has some sense that maybe something more needs to be addressed on this.  Dickerman knows what happened with Larry Feldman in 1993 with that particular lawsuit. And he brings the whole family to Larry Feldman.”  If anyone thinks that Dickerman had anything other than sleazy intentions when he referred the Arvizos to Feldman, look no further than his testimony on Day 24 of the trial.  He testified that he had an agreement with Feldman to share fees if the family filed a successful civil lawsuit against MJ in this case.

If Dickerman truly felt that “something more needs to be addressed on this”, then why didn’t he just call the police?

9. “At the search of the property they discovered a number of things that were of interest to that prosecution, including a lot of the pornography that Michael Jackson kept at his residence, and particularly in his bedroom.  It was all seized and from that became the largest effort that Santa Barbara has ever had in tracking down and identifying fingerprints on hundreds of magazines, each individual page, each revealing dozens and dozens of fingerprints, but many of those fingerprints ultimately confirmed to be fingerprints of Gavin and Gavin’s brother.” Let’s set the record straight, once and for all.  Michael Jackson, like any other normal, heterosexual, adult male, had sexual desires for adult women, and like millions of other men, he liked to read pornography.  But let me be perfectly clear; the only pornography that was found was legal, adult, heterosexual porn! There was no gay porn, and there certainly wasn’t any child porn!  In fact, if there was child porn, MJ would still be sitting in a jail cell right now!

Much of what the media and prosecution tried to pass as “porn” were really art books that contained people in various stages of undress. One of the editors of this site bravely went through the exhaustive process of analyzing all of the books that were catalogued by the Santa Barbara Police Department, and the results are listed in the following five articles:

https://vindicatemj.wordpress.com/2010/07/13/porn-found-inat-michael-jacksons-home/

https://vindicatemj.wordpress.com/2010/07/15/porn-found-at-michael-jacksons-home-2/

https://vindicatemj.wordpress.com/2010/07/16/porn-found-in-michael-jacksons-home/

https://vindicatemj.wordpress.com/2010/07/20/porn-found-in-michael-jacksons-home-4/

https://vindicatemj.wordpress.com/2010/07/21/porn-found-in-michael-jacksons-home-last-remark/

And as far as finding Gavin and Star’s fingerprints on those porn magazines, it is because they stumbled unto it themselves, and does NOT in and of itself mean that MJ showed it to them! (The same way that just because there are multiple DNA samples in a bed, it doesn’t mean that the occupants of the bed were sexually active!! Hint, hint!)

Here is William Wagener talking with MJ’s attorney Brian Oxman about Sneddon’s fingerprint tampering at the Grand Jury hearing:

10. “I can’t speak to other counties, but we have a tradition for high-profile cases.  Our little community of Santa Barbara. We don’t go to Santa Barbara because we want to be high-profile lawyers.  We go to Santa Barbara because we want to golf! Or be on the beach!” Once again, another unprofessional comment from someone who acts like he’s doing stand-up comedy!  Nobody cares about your fondness of golfing or going to the beach!

11.  “And in this particular case we also had the advantage of being able to do it in secret, hopefully keeping the transcript confidential and sealed, such that everybody would be protected from the content of that hearing from going public before we actually impaneled the jury.  We felt it would be in Mr. Jackson’s benefit.  We felt it would be in our benefit. That it would be the right thing to be able to do.” Stop lying, Zonen!  You know damn well that you and Sneddon were responsible for leaking the grand jury transcripts in January 14^th, 2005, almost 9 months after the grand jury proceedings ended and MJ was indicted in April 2004.  The timing of the leak is no coincidence, as it was leaked to coincide with the start of jury selection, in an attempt to taint the jury pool with prejudicial evidence.  Here is Mesereau’s response to the leak, as well as some idiots that felt that MJ leaked them himself in order to have a mistrial, which doesn’t make sense when he had no access to the documents at all!

And if you were really concerned about “benefiting” MJ, then why didn’t you have a preliminary hearing where he could cross-examine your witnesses, instead of having a grand jury where MJ’s defense team could not be present?  The following article describes succinctly the differences between a preliminary hearing and a grand jury hearing, and how the grand jury hearing is more advantageous to an overzealous prosecutor.  Here is an excerpt:

Countless Americans went to bed Wednesday night wrestling with two puzzling questions: Why was Jennifer Hudson voted off and what does being indicted by a grand jury mean for Michael Jackson?

Right around the time of the shocking “American Idol” development, news broke that Jackson had been indicted on child-molestation charges.

But Jackson was already charged, right? Yes, and who could forget that spectacle? But after a defendant is arraigned, there is typically a preliminary hearing where a judge decides if there’s enough evidence for the case to go to trial.

Prosecutors also have the option, according to Stephan DeSales, an Orange County criminal defense attorney who has handled many molestation cases, to instead request a grand jury review the case and determine if the accused should stand trial, which the Jackson grand jurors decided Wednesday.

The main differences between a preliminary hearing and a grand jury investigation is that the latter proceedings are held without defense attorneys present and are not open to the public.

“Fundamentally, it’s a way to bypass the ability of the defense to cross-examine, which they would have the right to do at a preliminary hearing,” said DeSales, former prosecutor for Los Angeles County. “The old saying is the district attorney could indict a ham sandwich if he wanted to because the grand jury is more or less a rubber stamp for the DA.”

The district attorney — in Jackson’s case Tom Sneddon  — is required, however, to present to the grand jurors any evidence that might clear the defendant.

Judging by Mesereau’s scathing 212 page motion to set aside MJ’s indictment due to prosecutorial misconduct, I think it’s fair to say that Sneddon absolutely did NOT present to the grand jurors any evidence that might clear MJ!!

12. “And then he met Michael Jackson, and we believed was molested by Michael Jackson, and subjected to a horrible ordeal of a trial.” The reason you and Sneddon “believed” that MJ had molested Gavin is because Gavin told you and your goons exactly what you wanted to hear!  You and Sneddon waited 10 years for someone –anyone!- to say that they were molested, when Larry Feldman and Stan Katz notified you of Gavin’s claims,  I bet you high-fived each other as if your favorite football team won the Super Bowl on the last play of the game!

There was no objectivity or professional skepticism whatsoever by any of the detectives who interviewed Gavin.  Robert Sanger, one of MJ’s attorneys, ripped one of your investigators for their shoddy work on Day 12 of the trial!  Here is an excerpt of his cross examination of Sergeant Robel:

MR. SANGER: All right. So June 20, you had information that had been obtained from Dr. Katz, and July 7th, you proceed to interview the kids, right?

SERGEANT ROBEL: That is correct.

MR. SANGER: And on that date, you indicated that, “We’re going to try our best to make this case work“; is that correct?

SERGEANT ROBEL: Let me refer to that.

MR. SANGER: You can look at — it’s in Davellin’s interview, page 33.

SERGEANT ROBEL: Okay. I’m on page 33. There was quite a bit more where that – in addition to what I said in regards to that.

MR. SANGER: Well, we can read the whole thing.

SERGEANT ROBEL: Okay. I already read the whole thing.

MR. SANGER: All right. So you said to Davellin at the — towards the end of her interview, “Okay. Okay. One thing I wanted to say and emphasize to you is that you guys are doing the right thing here. You know what, I know it’s scary, and I realize — really realize that you guys are going through a lot and you’ve been through a lot as a family. They’re the ones that have done wrong, not you. And trust me in this, and trust Detective Zelis, we’re law enforcement. We’re going to try our best to make this case work. I can’t guarantee it, where it’s going to go from here, but that’s why we’re interviewing everybody involved. I don’t care how much money they have” – do you want me to keep going? – “who he is, what — but he’s done wrong. You guys are the victims. Your family is. He is wrong in what he’s done. We’re going to try our best. Can’t guarantee it. We’re going to try our best to bring him to justice.” Did you say that?

SERGEANT ROBEL: I definitely said that.

MR. SANGER: Okay. So that’s not the statement of somebody who has an open mind who’s looking to see whether or not these people are telling the truth, is it?

13.  “He was outed while he was in high school.  One of Michael Jackson’s fans discovered where he was, and fixed the computer in such a way that all of the MySpace for students at that school, would immediately go directly to his new website, this person which identified Gavin by his photograph, as the person involved in the most uncomplimentary ways possible!” Well Zonen, guess who is the person who outed precious Gavin and Star to the world? It was your GIRLFRIEND, prosecution witness Louise Palanker!!!  She posted photos of them at a football game on her blog on December 22^nd, 2005, and had the audacity to criticize the fans that harassed them at their school.  Wanna have a good laugh?  Then read the following excerpt from her blog post:

I believed the boy, my friend, before the trial. After seeing the evidence presented in court, I now believe resoundingly beyond any personal doubt that Michael Jackson is guilty. The fans and I, have different beliefs. However, I do not, nor would I ever consider taunting or harassing them or their loved ones. It would be pleasant if they showed the same respect. But they don’t and they won’t. They will continue their smear campaign in service to their idol. It’s dangerous for any among us to place so much faith in a person we don’t even know.

My view and my belief in this boy and the veracity of the State’s case is firmly intact and it will not be swayed by anything I read or hear. For those who believe Michael, their faith is just as strong. However, harming the children doesn’t help Michael. The fact that they think it does, is what saddens me.

It’s funny how she says that he belief in MJ’s guilt is rooted in the “evidence” that she saw, yet to this day she has never stated exactly what that evidence was!

Here is a photo of Palanker and  “Ronnie” enjoying each other’s company! This photo is posted on Palanker’s blog.

14. “Where is he today?  He’s twenty years old.  He’s a 3^rd year student at a very prominent university on the east coast.  I’m not going to mention the name of the school, but anyone who would like to know come see me, I’ll tell you. He’s an Honor student who has a 3.5 GPA, and a double major in Philosophy and History, and he’s planning on going to Law School!” Here is the latest info on Gavin and Star:  they were both attending Georgia Military College, and they both made the Dean’s List in the Fall 2009 quarter. Gavin has since transferred to Georgia State University.

Good for them, huh? At least we know that Gavin, being the professional and unethical liar that he is, will join a profession that will welcome him with open arms! Read this post for more info on the Arvizos.

And as an added bonus (with special thanks to our reader known as  “Rockforeveron”), here is a recent photo of Gavin, provided by one of his ex-girlfriends!  Here is some dirt on Gavin that was posted on a forum.  Notice Gavin’s complete lack of contrition, which should eviscerate any hopes that he’ll one day speak out!

well i was on the internet talking to one of my friends from mcintosh high school when i brought up MJ and she started to break down because she was gavin’s ex gf she told me how he went around bragging how he accused michael of molesting him and everyone thought he was soo cool he even slipped up and said the story was made up so the girl actually went around the school and told everybody when she caught him cheating on her but anyways gavin goes to this gym it was in peachtree city (it still is) but they moved to a new location he likes boxing and MMA (mixed martial arts) and trains at a gym called LA boxing. he used to go to georgia military college but he transferred to Georgia State he has to be pursuing a major in business he goes by anton jackson (jackson is his step father’s last name), david jackson, anton arvizo or gavin arvizo. his brother goes by starr jackson or starr arvizo

here are his recently updated pics

Gavin & Star Arvizo with Louise Palanker. Aawwwwww! Look how big they've gotten! They're so adorable! NOT!!!!

15. “I spent time with him only a month ago. And he’s really doing remarkable well.  He has never asked for or taken a penny from anybody about any of the activity of this case.  Never.” & “But he has never taken a penny from anybody, and no intention of doing so.” No wonder Gavin will never speak out and tell the truth!  He’s FRIENDS with Zonen, and certainly Sneddon, and the rest of their goons!  He’ll never snitch on the people who encouraged and enabled his lies!  It wouldn’t surprise me if Gavin and Janet promised to share some of their settlement with them, which they easily would have won had MJ been falsely convicted.

Stay tuned for Part 5, featuring the one and only Tom Mesereau!

Update 11-08-2010

Here is additional information provided by Helena:

Gavin was friends with Tom Sneddon to a point of calling the Prosecutor by his first name:

“When the current accuser testified, jurors saw a teenager so at ease with prosecutors that he addressed Sneddon by his first name. But under grilling by Mesereau, he lapsed into a mumbling monotone, especially when asked about inconsistencies in his various accounts of the alleged molestations. http://articles.latimes.com/2005/may/05/local/me-jackson5/4

Thanks to Olga we have the LA Times and Santa Barbara News Archive for that period – so here are a couple of things to add to David’s post (could you update it David, please ?):

1) Zonen says the tickets to Brazil were one way only, but according to the LA Times it was a two-way ticket with a return day a week later – see several articles:

“Poking holes in her [Janet Arvizo’s] claim of the Brazilian plot, Mesereau produced an itinerary showing that round-trip tickets had been purchased for just a one-week jaunt from Los Angeles to Sao Paulo.”http://articles.latimes.com/2005/apr/19/local/me-jackson19

“Of her allegation that Jackson’s aides plotted to spirit the woman and her family to Brazil, the defense lawyer noted that the airline tickets for the journey were round-trip, with a return flight scheduled a week later.”http://articles.latimes.com/2005/apr/20/local/me-jackson20

“First up for the Santa Barbara County district attorney’s office was Cynthia C. Montgomery, a travel agent who said a Jackson aide told her to book one-way tickets to Brazil for the family of the cancer survivor who alleges the singer molested him in 2003, when he was 13.
The testimony seemed to support the prosecution’s contention that Jackson conspired to hold the family members against their will and hide them from the media after a British documentary raised questions about his relationship with the teenage boy.
But within moments, Jackson lawyer Thomas A. Mesereau Jr. pointed out that Montgomery is being investigated by the FBI for apparently making a secret videotape of Jackson on a chartered flight.
Montgomery conceded that she agreed to testify only after the prosecution granted her immunity, meaning nothing she said in court could be used against her.
“If you did not receive a grant of immunity, you wouldn’t testify, correct?” Mesereau asked.
“Um, per my lawyer’s instructions,” Montgomery said.
Montgomery acknowledged that she and Jackson were suing each other over a November 2003 flight from Las Vegas to Santa Barbara, where he surrendered to sheriff’s deputies.
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/apr/27/local/me-jackson27

Pryor, the mother of a 6-year-old son with Tucker, said she and the comic got to know the woman and her three children after a benefit for the cancer-stricken boy, who eventually accused Jackson of molesting him at the singer’s Neverland ranch.
They took the family under their wing, treating them to an outing at Knott’s Berry Farm and a trip to Oakland for a Raiders game, and inviting them to a relative’s wedding. Pryor said she became the mother’s confidante, acting as a sympathetic listener in countless phone conversations.
At one point in her testimony, Pryor broke into tears, explaining, “It’s hard for me because I really love the kids a lot.”
In February 2003, Pryor said the mother called her from the video shoot where she and her children lavishly praised Jackson as a warm, wise, humble, loving, father-like presence.
The mother “seemed happy” at the video session, Pryor testified, saying the woman was eager to tell the world that the relationship between Jackson and her son “was nothing more than a beautiful friendship.”

A few weeks later, Pryor said, the mother also seemed happy over plans for the trip to Brazil. She said that she, Jackson and their respective children would be attending Carnival, the Brazilian holiday celebration, and asked Pryor if she would like to come along.
About a month later, though, the mother changed her mind, citing her children’s extended absence from school and uncertainty over just where the family would stay in Brazil, Pryor testified.

Asked by defense attorney Thomas A. Mesereau whether the mother ever told her that “Michael Jackson was in a conspiracy to commit crimes against her family,” she replied swiftly.
“Absolutely not,” Pryor said.
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/may/20/local/me-jackson20

2) Zonen says that “Michael moved the entire family out of their studio apartment in east LA. They put all of their belongings into a storage facility where they actually didn’t know where it was. She didn’t know where any of her possessions were. Any of her property, her clothing, her furniture, to the extent that she had it.”

And this article says that it was Janet Arvizo who asked her belongings to be removed:http://www.jacksonaction.com/index.php?page=search.php&id=4683&search=

Geragos: ‘He was a ripe target’ May 14, 2005 12:00 AM
Excerpt:
Michael Jackson’s former criminal lawyer, Mark Geragos, [later replaced by Thomas Mesereau] testified Friday that he had attempted to protect the entertainer from a predatory family — not facilitate what the prosecution alleges was a conspiracy.
Mr. Geragos said he met the mother at Neverland Valley Ranch on Feb. 7, 2003, the day after a British documentary aired and created a public relations firestorm — including cries for social service and criminal investigations of the entertainer.
Mr. Geragos said he was hired to determine whether any investigations of Mr. Jackson had commenced. While at Neverland, he heard the boy had been instructed to refer to Mr. Jackson as “Daddy.”

“It gave me reason to pause,” Mr. Geragos testified. “In response to that, I decided to run a database search . . . I was concerned at that point, given the situation, that someone might use the situation to manipulate my client. It was not unknown to me that my client was a frequent target of litigation. . . . He was a ripe target.”
He said he became gravely concerned when his search unearthed a lawsuit the mother filed against J.C. Penney Co. She received a $150,000 settlement. Mr. Geragos testified that he instructed private investigator Bradley Miller to get a tape-recorded statement from the family and to surveil them in case they tried to sell their story to tabloids or file suit against the entertainer.
Senior Deputy District Attorney Ron Zonen’s cross-examination of Mr. Geragos was so aggressive that Judge Rodney Melville called for a timeout.
Prosecutors allege that Jackson associates moved the family out of their East Los Angeles apartment and put their belongings in storage because they were preparing to whisk them to Brazil. But Mr. Geragos testified that the mother asked his private investigator to help her store the items because she was moving in with her boyfriend. He said at that time he knew nothing about the planned Brazil trip.
On cross-examination, Mr. Zonen asked Mr. Geragos whether he had seen the documentary that contains “an admission to sleeping with boys.”
“What do you mean, sleeping with boys?” Mr. Geragos asked.
“That he sleeps with boys,” Mr. Zonen said.
“You mean that boys stay in his room?” Mr. Geragos asked.
“I mean that he sleeps with boys,” Mr. Zonen said.
“Are you saying it’s sexual?” Mr. Geragos asked.
The heated exchange continued until the judge told Mr. Zonen to take a timeout. When questioning resumed, the prosecutor asked whether Mr. Geragos advised his client not to sleep with boys.
Mr. Geragos responded he did not: “I saw someone who was childlike in his love for kids. I saw nothing criminal. Nothing nefarious.”
When asked what Mr. Jackson told him later about it, Mr. Geragos said, “He has consistently said he didn’t do anything — nothing untoward, nothing sexual and if someone spends the night in his room, it was just an act of unconditional love.
“The problem, Mr. Zonen, is when people say ‘sleeping with someone in his room’ and then there’s this jump to it being something awful and really, really bad.”
Mr. Geragos is scheduled to return to the stand on May 20.
e-mail: dhobbs@newspress.com

3) Zonen describes the security system on Michael’s inside rooms as a very complex system – locked door, a combination door, alarm system and up the stairs, the mere enumeration of which implies something sinister.

This is what Christopher Culkin, father of Macauley (who is an awful disciplinarian, a no friend to Michael though he doesn’t speak badly of him) says about the need for the alarm system and what it was like – among other things:

“…folks who would gladly pay for a helicopter ride who’s tour included as its centerpiece the buzzing of Michael’s home. To Michael the Scardey-Cat they all represented the specter of hooded terrorists, dressed as perfect ninjas, skidding down ropes onto the property, the better to commit “The Kidnapping of the Century”; and even though none of this ever did occur, there were other times when no less benign incidents would only go to feed this fear.
Take the morning when Michael arose and walked into his private garden, there to find a fan crouched in the bushes; a fan “fanatical” enough to enter the property and scale the wall and spend the night there (Can anyone yet remember the just who and the just where of John Lennon’s murder?!).

That Michael would respond to such as this by actually outfitting his bedroom with a relatively conspicuous store-bought beam alarm system (one that the entire cleaning staff knew existed and that could be simply stepped over), as well as with a so-called “secret room” (really a closet) to which he could run in times of such emergency should not surprise anyone; indeed, these are things that under like circumstances most any of us would do.

But when viewed through the lens of p-lia, the existence of these could only have a far more sinister purpose. And that was Michael’s problem in a nutshell, and there was little that Michael could thereafter ever do about it. It was the bell that couldn’t be un-rung. It was the genie who wouldn’t return to the bottle. It was the negative that can never be disproved. And it was a problem exacerbated by the fact that Michael couldn’t help (as few of us can) but be himself; his prim and prissy self. Unable to speak words like “sexually molest”, he could only respond in his ever effeminate way by saying, “I would never hurt a child”, which only made him sound more than anything else like a charter member of your local man-boy association. It was a perfectly impossible situation for him.

4) A couple of other things about the habits and character of the boy who is now of such an impeccable behavior and is so terribly “religious”:

A 16-year-old cousin of Jackson also testified Tuesday, saying she once saw the accuser and his younger brother snatch two bottles of wine and a wineglass from the kitchen of the singer’s Neverland ranch at 1 a.m. Simone Jackson was the third witness in two days to suggest that the brothers, then 12 and 13, were big drinkers who swilled wine without the pop star’s permission or knowledge.
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/may/18/local/me-jackson18

Former Neverland guard Shane Meridith said he caught the accuser and his brother “laughing and giggling” over a half-empty bottle of wine in the ranch’s ordinarily locked wine cellar. Jackson was not on the property at the time, he said.
And Angel Vivanco, a chef’s assistant, said the accuser’s brother, who was 12 at the time, threatened him in order to get a liquor-laced milkshake.
“He said if I didn’t do it, he’d tell Michael Jackson and I’d get fired,” Vivanco testified.
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/may/17/local/me-jackson17

Under cross-examination by lead defense lawyer Thomas Mesereau, Ms. Bell [a flight attendant] described what she saw on the chartered flight from Miami to Santa Barbara in February 2003.

She told jurors that the boy was rude and out of control and characterized Mr. Jackson as a quiet, gentle man.
“(The boy) was unusually rude, discourteous,” Ms. Bell testified. “I remember him talking about how, ‘I got this watch from Michael and it’s real expensive.’ . . . He was obnoxious. “When I served him food, he said ‘This isn’t warm. This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be.’ It was embarrassing to have him on board, actually.”

She then described Mr. Jackson as “soft-spoken.”

“Is there anything peculiar about the means or method you serve Mr. Jackson alcohol?” Senior Deputy District Attorney Gordon Auchincloss asked Cynthia Bell, who worked on a jet chartered by the pop star.
“Mr. Jackson is a very private drinker,” Ms. Bell responded. “I initiated serving him wine in a Diet Coke can. . . . I serve other clients that way.”
“Whose idea was this?” Mr. Auchincloss asked.
“It was mine,” she said.
Mr. Auchincloss continued: “Did Mr. Jackson ever tell you to serve him wine in a Diet Coke can?”
“No, he did not,” she said.
“Did you ever see him share his can of wine with anyone else?” the prosecutor asked.
“No,” she replied.

THE JACKSON TRIAL: Witness thwarts wine allegation: http://www.jacksonaction.com/index.php?page=search.php&id=4722&search=

5) And one more thing – the assistant to Michael’s lawyer Mark Geragos, whose name is Bradley Miller has turned out to be a patient of psychiatrist Dr. Katz (the one to whom Larry Feldman sent Gavin for an interview and who eventually reported the case to the police):

THE JACKSON CASE: Key Players
By Scott Hadly and Dawn Hobbs

August 25, 2004 12:00 AM

Dr. Stan Katz, a Beverly Hills psychologist who interviewed the 13-year-old boy in this case. Dr. Katz also assisted in the 1993 case. He reported the allegations in the current one in June 2003 after a therapy session with the boy. In an odd twist, defense attorneys revealed that both the alleged victim and the private investigator who worked for Mr. Geragos, Bradley Miller, were patients of Dr. Katz.

Bradley Miller is a Beverly Hills private investigator who worked for Mr. Geragos on the case. He reportedly was involved in a videotaped interview with the boy and his family after a British documentary aired which shows Mr. Jackson holding hands with the boy and stating that he shares his bed with children.