Michael Jackson’s Friend Brett Barnes Talks To Charles Thomson. TRANSCRIPT OF THE INTERVIEW, part 2

The likely reversal of Robson’s case by the Appellate court was somewhat a distraction, but not much of a surprise considering that the powerful forces that did away with Michael Jackson are still fully at work against him.

These forces will never let Michael Jackson rest in peace and will continue with their dirty slander job until they reach their coveted goal of ruining his Estate and shredding Michael’s reputation into pieces. They will tell one lie after another, adjust their fabrications to the newly found evidence of Michael’s innocence, and when their old stories are fully disproven, will claim without batting an eyelid that they never said it (we’ve been there, so we know).

Then they will invent something new and start it all over again – hire more accusers and their so-called witnesses, make other mocumentaries, create more hype, etc. etc. and thus promote their agenda for as long as the public believes their trash and allows it to happen.

Anyone who expected anything different was extremely naïve in thinking that they will ever give up.

Well, all it means to those who know the innocent truth about Michael Jackson is that the truth seekers should not give up either. If Robson’s and Safechuck’s cases have to go to a civil court, so let it be. After all, the court hearings may turn out to be the only chance to tell the general public the real truth about Michael Jackson.

And even if the worst comes to the worst and the verdict is unfair – which may very well happen in the current environment of lies, falsehood and confusion, all it will mean is that the job of proving that Michael Jackson was innocent and was massively framed up will have to go on.

And if this job has to be done for years, let it be. If it has to be done for decades, let it be too. And if it has to be done by a new generation, let us pass to them what we know, so that they take over from us and continue with the job for as long as it takes.

In other words, we should make it clear to those who are keen on degrading Michael Jackson that as long as they attribute to him what he didn’t commit, the people to whom the truth matters will refute their lies and will do what needs to be done to clean his name of all the slander and dirt.

So with this calm and peaceful thought in mind, let us return to our regular job of telling the truth about Michael Jackson and go back to the interview given by Michael’s friend Brett Barnes to journalist Charles Thomson in June 2022 (transcribed only now).

The transcript of the first part of the interview is here, and my comments on some of Brett’s words are in this post. Below you will find the transcript of the second hour of Brett’s interview (0:58-1:59) with another half hour still left and more commentary to be made in the following posts. Please note that the bold type is mine, while the words where Brett was especially emphatic and wanted to stress his point are in italics.

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BRETT’S INTERVIEW IN 1993

Charles Thomson: Did you observe how he was being affected by this investigation and these allegations?

Brett Barnes: Again, it’s not something that was significant enough for me to remember what it was. He would just I assume, would just keep it away, not let it consume him. So it was not really… and again, since I was young too, so it’s not something that we would have any deep discussions about other than him saying he doesn’t know, like he didn’t know why it was happening. Just didn’t understand why it was.

CT:  Did he seem different to you though? Did he seem depressed or, or withdrawn, or did you not really notice any difference in his demeanor?

BB: Uh, I was pretty young. If I had to make a guess on my memories around that time, I would say that it was a little bit, like looking back on those memories, there was a little bit of that energy gone, if that sort of makes sense.

CT: Amid that whole … because I’ve said at the beginning of this conversation that the only interview you’ve ever given was in 1993 and that was in response to these allegations. And it was you and Wade Robinson together. How did that interview come about?

BB: I don’t remember. We didn’t do the video. We didn’t do the interview at the same time.

CT: Oh, I see. So you were interviewed separately but for the same thing.

BB: Yeah.

CT: Did you know Wade at that time?

BB: We had met him and his mom at the Jam video. [in April 1992]

Brett Barnes in a TV interview in 1993

CT: Now, just for the record, I’ve got some questions about that interview that you did in ‘93. I want to give you the opportunity to put your answers on record. Did you do it voluntarily?

BB: So I don’t really remember, uh, ins and outs of it. And to tell you the truth, it’s understandable in my opinion, because of the things, these sort of things, I guess it’s hard for me to, to be asked these questions, because these type of things aren’t significant to me.

Because it’s not what my life … it’s not things that as an adult would, they would be things that I would be remembering or have committed to memory. But as a child, these aren’t really things that I would commit to memory – because look at, look at things I was doing at that time, the amount of amazing things I’ve seen in my life. These are the things that I’ve committed to memory rather than caring about being in Neverland when it was raided. Things like that just aren’t committed to memory for me.

CT: Okay.

BB: And I’m sorry, I forgot what you asked.

CT: Did you do it voluntarily?

BB: That’s right. Sorry. I went completely off topic (laughs). I don’t remember. I don’t remember the ins and outs of it, but I know I wouldn’t have done something, I wouldn’t have been able to be forced to do something I didn’t want to do. That’s still true today.

CT: Did Michael in any way, coach you or tell you what to say?

BB: I don’t even think that he… He definitely wasn’t there when we, when we did it. It was mum, Karlee, I think, and myself was there. But he wasn’t there, he wasn’t there when it was recorded.

CT: Did anybody else coach you or tell you what to say?

BB: No, of course not. All it was just answer these questions. Tell the truth. That’s all it was.

CT: Were you paid or induced in any other way…

BB: Nope.

CT: ….to do the interview?

BB: Nope. If I was paid, I definitely didn’t see the money.

CT: Okay.  And were you telling the truth in the interview?

BB: Absolutely.

HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF $ FOR LIES

CT:  Okay. So at the time the media started flying around with checks for hundreds of thousands of dollars and giving them to people who had some connection with Michael Jackson in return for stories that were negative and a number of people accepted that money. And when they told those stories, they used your name in those stories.

And I want to give you the opportunity to comment, to explicitly say what you think of these claims that were made. So there was a security guard who sold a story saying that he saw Michael Jackson performing oral sex on you in a Neverland changing room. Did that ever happen?

BB: That’s disgusting.  No, of course not. That’s absolutely disgusting. If dude saw that, why didn’t he do anything at that time? Why didn’t he go to the police? Why didn’t… why wasn’t there anything? So you are gonna see something like this happen and then that’s … you’re just gonna walk away from that?

For the lies told about Brett Barnes the security guard Ralph Chacon received from the D.A. office a money bonus and a permit to carry a gun. Here is the story.

CT:  So you refute that story completely.

BB: Absolutely.

CT:  There was a maid called Adrian McManus, who I know you are aware of…

BB: Yeah.

CT:  …who said that she saw Michael put his hand on your butt and kiss you on the cheek. Is it possible that that ever happened?

BB: No.  I don’t think that would’ve happened at all. [her story is here]

CT:  There was, um, a guy called Victor Gutierrez who published a source of erotic novel about Michael, which he claimed was based on the secret diary of Jordan Chandler, although the Chandlers denied having anything to do with Gutierrez.

He in quite graphic terms described you, Michael and Jordan Chandler engaging in group sex together. Is that true?

BB: That’s not true at all. That’s gross and disgusting. Isn’t this the same dude that’d run off without paying what he was expected to?

CT:  That’s him.

Victor Gutierrez, the dude who wrote a pedophilia fantasy about MJ and ran off to his native Chile not to pay $2,7mln in damages for defamation

BB:  Yeah. Yeah.

CT:  That’s him. Yeah. Did he ever contact you before publishing that book?

BB:  Not that I’m aware of.

CT:  Do you recall anyone contacting you to ask you whether Adrian McManus’s story was true before publishing it or broadcasting it?

BB:  No. Not that I’m aware of.

CT:  And the security guard story. Do you recall anybody calling to ask you whether that was true?

BB: No. No, not that I’m aware of.

CT:  It was reported sometime after the Chandler settlement that Sneddon had either personally travelled to Australia or had sent somebody else to Australia on his behalf to try to convince other children to make allegations and it has been reported in the past that your family was approached during that trip. Do you remember that happening?

BB: Uh, yeah. I remember that to a certain detail.

CT:  Was it Sneddon or was it someone else?

BB: I believe it was him. Because my mom has, um, you know… stories will come up every so often, different aspects of our experiences during family gatherings. So like them coming over has been brought up before, and I remember her saying he was definitely there. Because I didn’t at that time, I didn’t really, I didn’t speak to him. So it was him. There was someone else – mom said it was a reporter. But it might not have been. And there was a couple of sheriffs there I believe. And she said that they said to not say that they were there, that they had come. If anyone asked… that they hadn’t come.

But yeah, he was definitely there. So they, because they had asked to speak to me, but mom and dad said no, not to speak to me, but for them to speak to mom and dad. We played in the, um, neighborhood park while they were there because we’d come back from somewhere. I remember we come back from somewhere and there was this car that was parked out at the front of our place and then as we arrived they got out of their car and came up to us. So mum was like, “go play while we speak to these people.”

CT:  Oh, I see. So you didn’t have any face to face interaction with them. You just are aware that that happened?

BB: Yeah. Correct.

CT:  But you had already told the sheriff at the ranch that nothing had happened to you.

BB: Yeah. Correct.

HOW IT FEELS TO LIVE WITH THESE STORIES

CT:  Now, you know, I’ve just asked you some pretty horrible questions really. I mean, I would find it horrible to have somebody ask me these questions.

BB: Mm-hmm.

CT:  But unfortunately the fact that the stories have been placed into the public domain means that really … especially since the people that published them, never gave you the opportunity to comment on them. So I would like to know from you how it feels to know that those stories are out there now, how does it feel to be Brett Barnes and know that people can Google your name and that stuff comes up. What does that do to you?

BB: This is part of the reason why a lot of people don’t know. Because to me, it’s what.. what you’ve got to understand from my viewpoint is …. nothing ever happened to me, I’m categorically… absolutely nothing, 100% nothing has ever… nothing bad has ever happened to me, so from my viewpoint for these things to be said about me “that has happened to me” is shameful because these things never happened to me. So that’s just the personal aspect of it for me, how I feel that anyone can google my name and these are the first things that come up about me. So there’s that aspect of it.

But then there’s also my parents that have to deal with this – that it’s their son that this is being talked about but then as I said before they’re viewed upon as parents who have apparently seen things going on but just let it go to the side just.. just for the sake of being around a famous person, just for clout.

And then you’ve got my sister who has to live through this as well. So her brother’s getting … say that people are saying these things about it and then her as a sister has… what she has to deal with this sort of things.

But then you’ve got my grandparents. This is their grandchild that these things are being said there, and it goes on and on and on.

CT:  Yeah. I can’t imagine. I can’t imagine. I mean, there’s, it is difficult to imagine any remedy now. There’s no way of unringing that bell, if you know what I mean. So how do you cope with it? How do you live with it?

BB: Um (his voice breaks), sorry to be sad…

CT:  Sure.

(Silence)

BB: (with a deep sigh) Keep your life separate.  That’s how you deal with it.  Maintain your privacy.

OUR FRIENDSHIP NEVER STOPPED

CT:  Okay. I’m gonna move on from this subject for the time being. Did your relationship change with him in any way after the, um, the Chandler thing or did you basically have ongoing contacts? Because it would’ve been very easy for him to take advice from someone to just stop hanging around with kids…

BB: Absolutely.

CT:  …or reduce his contact with kids or whatever, so did you notice any change in your relationship with him really or not?

BB: Not really. Like our friendship never stopped it. It never, it never quieted down. We never grew distant. It was always… well, to me, at least to me it was always the same. I never felt a change.

CT:  In 2005, you actually said that you basically continued to visit Michael and spend time with him, you know, roughly speaking once a year until the 2000s.

BB: Mm-hmm

CT:  So it was pretty consistent relationship?

BB: Yeah. Yeah. Like I said, nothing ever changed from the time I was five years old up until he passed. Nothing ever changed.

CT:  I think that’s important because there is a narrative which has been built up, which is that he kind of befriended kids, and then when they got to a certain age, he lost interest in them or ditched them or replaced them or whatever, but that doesn’t seem to have been the case with you and your family. So it kind of disproves that narrative.

BB: Mm-hmm

CT:  As you got older, did your friendship change in terms of… not in terms of, you know, frequency of seeing him or anything like that, but in terms of the content of your conversations or, or was it still just goofing around?

BB: The dynamic? Of the friendship?

CT:  Yeah, exactly. How did it evolve over time?

BB: One of the things that he instilled in me or one of my, um, my core beliefs is to stay young at heart, um, never lose a child within you. So even as I’ve grown up, there’s still a lot of goofing around. So there is definitely that aspect that remained the same. So a lot of the childhood antics, playing pranks, telling jokes, all of that stuff, the goofiness was always, always, always present.

But as I grew and matured, there were a lot more mature conversations happening. So like, he would tell me more about the business side of things that he was doing, just give me like little insights into the things that he was working on. He would have music conversation. Yeah, it was just as I grew and matured there would definitely be more, yeah.

I don’t know how to explain it – just more of a friendship as with all … It’s really weird, it’s the same progression as – because I’ve got friends, like part of my inner circle – two friends of mine that I’ve been friends with since 94, year seven of high school. So it’s the same sort of maturity as I’ve had with them. It’s the exact same type of friendship.

CT:  As you got older, did you ever worry about Michael in the sense that he seemed like and even spoke about actually being lonely and isolated by his fame? And in interviews, he often didn’t sound as if he really enjoyed being famous. As you got older and the pop star mystique faded away, did you ever worry about him?

BB: Not really, not really worried about him. Because it was never, there was never anything that I saw would give me cause to worry. It was just more of a feeling of sadness, more so that he couldn’t experience the normality of life as what we experienced. That he can’t like we… he couldn’t go anywhere, like nowhere. Can’t go down. I need something, I’ve got to go down to the shops. He can’t do it. You need to, you need to organize, you need to pre-plan it, you need to have a secret service style (laughs) itinerary of just going down the shops.  So it was just more sadness that he couldn’t experience those things, that there was such a microscope on his life as well. That you just can’t experience a normal life.

CT:  Yeah, I mean it kind of felt as he entered the 2000s that it was almost sort of emanating a sense of like “I’m really over this now, I’m kind of sick of it”.

BB: To me that wasn’t that, wasn’t so much of…. I don’t put that down to the success, to the fame side of things, that there was definitely a little bit of light lost in his eyes, to use that sort of phrase. What was said about him affected him more so.

CT:  Did you ever feel, because he testified in 2005 or 2006 that he did end up essentially with a painkiller dependency. Do you think that might be what you were seeing when you talk about the light, a loss of light, do you think he was kind of dulled by medication or do you think it was more of an emotional thing?

BB: I would say that it’s more of an emotional thing. I was never around, I was never privy to any of the painkiller medication. I never saw him take painkillers or anything like that. So that part, that part of his life, I was never aware of. I was never really aware of or party to. So I can’t comment on that side of things.

But from my perspective, it would be that if there was that dependency and that was … the light that was dimming, it was because of the whole thing. The root of it all is exactly the same. Either way.

CT:  And when you say the light was dimming, how did that manifest itself? Was it like he didn’t want to do stuff or he seemed groggy? What, what are you referring to when you say that?

BB: It’s not that he seemed groggy or anything like that. There was no physical there, there was nothing like that.  I would say it’s just the accusations, the way he was accused of and the way that it was presented in the media. That has the ability, if that happened to anyone, that has the ability to break a person. So it would be the impacts of that. When you, when you see a person and how they act, the lack of light in the eye is more so to say that the energy that you saw beforehand, the carefreeness, the sense of adventure,  these types of aspects would just dull, dull down a little bit.

CT:  So was it less fun being around him at that point?

BB: To say that is a little bit dismissive. To say it is a quantifiable measure, to say that at one point it was this high and then it’s a little less now than yet. That would be, that’s not to say that it was devoid of fun. It was just… the energy levels just weren’t the same.

CT:  I wonder if there was an impact in the sense of him, it must be difficult to face the world knowing that the world knows that this has been accused of you. So maybe that kind of made him more reticent to engage with the world because he kind of knew that this was hanging over him. Did you get that sense?

BB: I can only say what it was like when I was there, obviously. So it’s not, it’s not like there was ever any talks of, “I need to go do this. No, I need to put out another album, I need to go do another tour, but I don’t really feel like doing it. I don’t really want to face the world.” We never had these type conversations. It’s not the type of thing we talked about.

It’s not to say that he didn’t, he just… it was more so like how I say the goofing off of things sort of was toned down a little bit. Like there was another sort of marker that I noticed as well. It is that after Neverland got raided he was a little bit… like his privacy obviously was invaded. And just like anyone feels… our family house got broken into many years back but still I remember, I’ll never forget that fear of the invasion of privacy, so to have that same sort of thing happen at the house – you’d look at the house a little bit different.

So for him, Neverland was a little bit … his feeling about Neverland had changed as well after it all happened because his privacy was invaded. So it’s the same sort of thing that I feel. And as I said, I can only talk about my experiences, but as I feel his… like it definitely hurt him what he was accused of, what was said about him.

And I think that that’s something that people don’t understand because they’re only seeing the presented side of him and not him as a person. So for him to still carry on and do shows while all this is going on, to perform at such an elite level night after night, to keep doing it, to keep this all going is definitely a testament to him.

CT:  And what effect did fatherhood seem to have on him?

BB: Yeah, that was, that was really cool to see. That was really cool to see. Man, he, yeah, he was a great father. He loved his children. He loved his children. Yeah. That was really, that was a really cool thing to see.

I QUIT MY JOB TO COME AND TESTIFY

CT:  Now, clearly around this time, around the early 2000s, there is a second set of allegations, which result in you going to the trial to testify, which results in another round of intrusion into your life.

BB: Mm-hmm.

CT:  Were you asked to come and testify or did you volunteer to come and testify?

BB:  We, because it was Mom and Karlee as well, we were asked if we wanted to, so we had the choice. I didn’t have to go and testify. So we chose to.

CT:  And you were 23 years old when you testified.

BB: Yep.

CT:  You told the jury, I think the first thing you told them because Mr. Mesereu asked you the question – was that you had actually quit your job as a roulette dealer to come to Santa Maria to testify. Why did you have to quit your job to come to Santa Maria?

BB: They wouldn’t let me take time off to do it, so it was more important to me to do it. I was able to find employment afterwards, which wasn’t too bad. That wasn’t a concern of mine at all.

CT:   Would that mean essentially though that you did actually incur a financial loss as a result of going to Santa Maria to testify?

BB: Yeah.

CT:  So presumably you were not paid to testify.

BB: No.

CT:  So you quit your job and took a financial hit to go and testify at the trial?

BB: Of course. I would think anyone would do that.

CT:   And I’m not going to rehearse your entire testimony because you’ve said quite forcefully earlier in this conversation that nothing inappropriate ever happened between you and Michael.

BB: Mm-hmm .

CT:   So just to, uh, encapsulate it in one question really, there’s nothing about your testimony that you wish to revise or change on that front? Every answer you gave you stand by now?

BB: Sure. Yep. I do.

CT:   I will just ask you a couple of questions in response to stuff they said in ”Leaving Neverland”  just because I think we need to give you the opportunity to give explicit unequivocal answers to these questions. Did anybody try to coach you about what to say on the stand?

BB: No.

CT:  Did Michael try to coach you about what to say on the stand?

BB: No.

CT:   Did he threaten you…

BB: Absolutely not (laughs).

CT:   …in order to get you to testify?

BB: No.

CT:  Did anybody else threaten you?

BB: No. No.

CT:  They threatened you with perjury?

BB: No.

CT:   Or anything like that?

BB: No.

CT:  Threatened you with legal action?

BB: No.

CT:  Some of the former employees who I mentioned earlier did come to court and repeat the stories that they had been paid for 10 years earlier.

BB: Mm-hmm

CT:  So your position remains that those former employees were not telling the truth when they testified at the trial?

BB: Ab-so-lu-te-ly.

CT:  You had already told the prosecutors that those stories were lies.

BB: Mm-hmm

CT:  And you told the sheriffs that nothing had ever happened to you, that those stories were lies.

BB: Mm-hmm

CT:   Did anybody from the prosecution ever contact you and ask you whether those stories were true before deciding to call those witnesses?

BB: No.

CT:  What do you think of that?

BB: That’s very, that’s very strange. It’s the same thing as I don’t understand why there was no rebuttal [in the “Leaving Neverland” movie]. If you want to tell the complete story, why wouldn’t you… why, if you are wanting to tell a story … why wouldn’t you want to include the complete story?

Well, obviously I would like to think that me being named or a part of your version of the story, shouldn’t I be included in that? Shouldn’t my voice be included in that?

And the media is telling a lie that Brett simply “didn’t offer commentary” for Leaving Neverland and, “according to reports, did not want to take part in the project” [March 1, 2019] https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/a26582972/brett-barnes-michael-jackson-leaving-neverland/

BB: I don’t know, I would think that that’s how I would have handled it unless it’s not going along with my viewpoint. Then of course I wouldn’t want to include it.

CT:  The reason you were called to testify or you were asked if you would like to testify specifically because the prosecution had called these witnesses to say that they had seen things happening to you. So in essence it’s the prosecution’s decision to call those witnesses, which made your testimony relevant. If nobody had come to court and said that this had happened, then there would not have been any reason for you to come to court and say that it didn’t. So in that sense, I would imagine it would be quite aggravating that the prosecution would call these witnesses and not even bother to actually ask you whether the stories were true or not.

BB: Mm-hmm, it’s a really bad … that’s a comment on them though, to say how thorough can your job have been done?

CT: How did you feel about the way that you were cross-examined by the prosecution at the trial?

BB: What do you mean?

CT:  It was quite belligerent. It comes across in the transcript. I mean, how did it feel to be questioned in that way, in a room full of people, by the prosecution?

BB: It was Rob Zonen, he was asking me the questions. I didn’t like him. I didn’t like him much at all. He was very, as you say, belligerent. It really was. It was uncomfortable. I didn’t like, I didn’t like that part at all.

CT:  You testified under Zonen’s questioning that you actually continued to share a bed with Michael until you are 19, which I think actually was a bit of a shock to a lot of people because of this narrative that had been built up about befriending boys and then just dumping them or replacing them.  But did there ever come a time where you had a conversation with Michael or, or how did it, how did that stop happening? Did you just feel uncomfortable with it or…?

BB: It didn’t… it’s not that it stopped. And to “share a bed” is a little bit weird to say as well. It’s not that. It’s not like the way that is said. It is just really, it’s really weird to me.  

Just as I said, it’s not something that I concentrate on because it was just sleep. You just go to sleep and that’s it.  So it is not… there was no “All right, this is it. We’re stopping this. This has to stop now”.  There was nothing like that at all.  “We’re not going to go forward with this” – there was never a conversation like that. It just wouldn’t happen, so that it is something that is no clear memory for me as to where it stopped.  And it really actually didn’t…. from, uh, 19 to 23 I didn’t go over there that much, between those time frames. And so it’s not like we had that conversation where nothing happened, it just sort of … just didn’t happen.  I can’t explain why it didn’t, it just didn’t, but afterwards if I… if I’m tired and I need to sleep, I’m sleeping, and if there’s a bed there I’m sleeping in it.

NOTE: No one should doubt Brett’s words because he is not too good at explaining himself. His ingenuousness is exactly the reason why his story is so sincere, frank and so true. It is a liar’s story that will usually sound smooth, glib, seemingly logical and broken into certain “stages of abuse” – all of it because it was very well thought out and was probably even rehearsed.

In real life things are often spontaneous, and 30+ years later it will be nearly impossible to recall what you did when you were a teenager, especially if nothing bad happened to you and your memory certainly didn’t retain any extraordinary details about it.  

CT:  Now there was an exchange between you and Zonen, Mr. Zonen. The prosecution sort of tried to insinuate that you were unable to be honest with yourself about things that Michael Jackson might have done to you out of personal shame. So I’m just going to read you the question and the answer. So Zonen asks you, “Mr. Barnes, do you consider it disgraceful to have been molested?” and you replied, “Absolutely.”

BB:  Yeah. That’s actually something that I wanted to … um, I was thinking about that before, because someone has brought that up because I objected, after that. And I remember that actually clearly.  Well, I guess, yeah, I didn’t understand. I thought he was asking a different question. I thought he was asking, “Is it bad for a child to be molested?” Is it bad for something to happen to a child, rather than being the victim of it?

CT:  Yes. The next day your sister Karlee was on the stand.

BB: Yeah.

CT:  And she was questioned by Gordon Auchincloss, one of the other prosecutors.

BB: Yeah.

CT:  And so the exchange between Mr. Auchincloss and Karlee went as follows: “Do you know if your brother thinks it’s a disgrace to be a victim of child molestation?” “Of course he would. I would too.”

“So if he had to admit that it would be disgraceful, wouldn’t it?” “Well, no, it’s a disgrace that it would happen to a child. Not a disgrace to admit that it happened, because it’s a disgrace that it has happened”.

BB: Right. So Karlee did that same thing.

CT:  Yes. So, I just want to clarify what you actually meant by that statement, because it has been used since then to try to suggest that you were….

BB: (interrupts him) Absolutely. I hate that. And I apologize if anyone has been offended by that. That’s not my intention at all. My position is, is that it’s not… It’s never, ever, ever, ever bad to be a victim. The victim should never be blamed. There is no fault at all [that] should be placed on the victim. It’s the perpetrator that should always have the blame and it’s bad for it to have happened. You’re not a bad person for it to have happened to you.

CT:  Yes. And so essentially what you are, you seem to be saying is that if anything ever had happened to you, you would not have any problem with saying that it happened.

BB:  Absolutely not. I would never be ashamed to be a victim. I would never be ashamed to be a victim. It doesn’t matter who it was. I’m not ashamed to being a victim of anything. So I absolutely… My position would be that I would want the person that – if something had happened to me – I would make sure that that person is punished. I would absolutely do everything in my power to make sure that that person was punished.

THE MATTER OF ‘365 DAYS’

CT:  There’s something else from the testimony that I just want to give you the opportunity to clarify as well, because it too has become part of the sort of Michael Jackson folklore, which is that, uh, when Karlee was on the stand, your sister, it caused quite a stir because she testified that during one two-year period, she estimated that you and Michael had slept in the same room together for approximately 365 days.

And so basically on the stand, she did some crude mathematics and estimated that your family had been with Michael roughly six months of the year for two years in a row. And therefore she believed that you and Michael had shared a room for 365 days, which was quoted endlessly and is still quoted today. Do you believe it is actually true that you and Michael shared a room for 365 days in two years?

BB: I would say that I definitely, definitely for the most part would stay with him.  Definitely 100% for the most part, not 100% of the time, but for the most part I would stay with him, not a question about it.

So whether that is 365 days in the two-year period because that’s how much time we spent there, and yeah, I would say that’s a fair estimate. And again it’s not something … it’s just something that I know… I don’t recall every single time that we did because it was just, it was the sleeping arrangements. It was just a sleep.

NOTE:  Sorry to interrupt again but these 365 days seem to require still another comment (the previous one was in this post).

The thing is that same as his sister Karlee in 2005, Brett is also making calculations about his stays with Michael Jackson in terms of how much time he missed school in Australia. In the first part of the interview he said:

BB: From my memory we were going across pretty often, from my grade 5 – 6, my years in school, grade 5, grade 6. I was actually there for like half of them, because we were going, like we went over on tour, and we were going back and forth to the States.

Karlee calculated 365 days in two years because she was in grades 7 and 8 in 1992 and 1993 and missed half of each, and Brett was in grades 5 and 6, and missed half of them too.

I am even sure that they exchanged their calculations between themselves and with their parents, who were gravely concerned about the fact, and this is why both Karlee and Brett have so ready an answer about a whole year they stayed away from home. It seems that they are even a little boastful and proud that their adventure was so long.

But a whole year away from home absolutely does not mean that Brett spent all this time in Michael’s room and was “alone” there too.

In August-November 1993, for example, the Barnes family stayed with Jackson for a month and a half only – first in August and then in November, when the Barnes joined the 13-year old Frank Cascio and his younger brother Eddie to accompany MJ on the South American leg of the Dangerous tour.  And during that month all three of them kept Michael company and stayed with him in his hotel room.

Brett also says that this was the time “they spent there”, meaning not only himself but the whole of his family which was travelling “back and forth to the States”. He mentions that Michael Jackson wasn’t with them 100% of the time they spent away from home in Australia, however whenever he was, Brett definitely preferred not to miss the chance and stayed with Michael Jackson in his quarters.

The reason for that is the same as with all other children and Brett spoke about it in the first part of the interview:

 “The thing is that he was such a magnet for all people – like everyone just wanted to be around him all the time because that’s just the type of person he was. So it just would’ve been that fact of just never wanting to leave his side. Just everybody wanted to be around him 24/7. So it just would have evolved from that.”

But there is still one more point to all of the above, overlooked by many.

Considering that the 365 days story is so favorite a darling with the MJ naysayers, Brett could easily deny it when speaking to Charles Thomson thirty years later, claim that he didn’t remember it or say that his sister was wrong in her calculations, however he does nothing of the kind, and this alone is proof enough that Brett is being exceptionally frank, honest and sincere with us, even at the danger of being misunderstood by his listeners.  

And if he is so honest and open about that, why should anyone doubt his other statements about Michael Jackson? For example, the statement he made under oath at the 2005 trial and repeats on all other occasions – that MJ neither intended nor did a single bad thing to him during the many years of their close friendship with each other.

 In other words, when Brett Barnes bares his soul to us, even at the risk of doing potential damage to himself, you cannot be selective about what he says, and believe one thing and disbelieve another.  

THE DINNER WITH WADE ROBSON DURING THE TRIAL

CT:  Now you actually stayed at Neverland during the trial. How did Michael appear to be faring physically and mentally at that point?

BB: He was definitely a different person because he was ….you could tell he was going through it. You could really tell he was going through it. That’s when I would probably say that he was frail.

CT:  There’s a story in “Leaving Neverland” about a dinner. It’s a story that Wade Robson and, I think, possibly his sister tell in the TV show where they say that everybody was sitting around the table having dinner and Paris was trying to get Michael’s attention. And he appeared to be basically mentally not there, just completely checked out.

And Wade Robinson cites that dinner as having strengthened his resolve to testify in Michael’s defense.  But you went public on Twitter and you said that actually your memory accorded with Taj that that dinner had actually occurred after Wade Robson’s testimony and not before it.

BB: Mm-hmm. Because I remember when that came out, and a question, and I asked Mom and Karlee if they remembered, and they both said the same thing.

CT:  So you remember it being after.

BB: Yeah. Because I remember it was the next ….

CT:  Because you and Wade testified on the same day.

BB: Yeah. Because we, the way that it went is that we went there one day when we were expecting when… the prosecution was expected to rest. They didn’t rest that day. They rested the next day, which is when we went or it might have been the end of that day. So we, we were called to testify the next day. And then the following day was when the rest of our families like his mom and his sister, my mom and my sister were called as witnesses. And then the day after that, they left. And we had the dinner the night before they left. So it was after testifying.

CT:  And that recollection, is it part of the reason, you know you are remembering the same dinner, presumably is because of that incident with Paris. Would that be fair to say?

BB: It’s not the incident with Paris is how I remember it. The way the dining room was set up is that there’s multiple tables, so because we were staying at the ranch the whole time, whereas they weren’t – I don’t know where they were staying or what they were doing – but because we were there for the whole time, like we were having dinner with our bread all the time, so we decided that it would be, um, fair for them to sit on the main table.

And then, um, Karlee, me and Taj were sitting on another table, but in the same room. So I wasn’t at that table when this supposedly happened, but I was in the same room. But the way that I remember it is that it couldn’t have been, it couldn’t have been something to have happened for him to, um, attribute his testimony to it because the dinner happened after the testimony. I remember having the dinner because the next day they were leaving.

CT:  Okay. So in essence, the reason that you know that it’s the same dinner is because you were staying there and you were having dinner in the dining room every day.

BB: Yeah.

CT:  And that was the only day that the Robsons were there for dinner.

BB:  Yes. Correct.

CT:  Right. I understand. I understand. Okay. Did you talk to Wade at that time? Did he, did you have any conversations about having testified?

BB: Uh, not really because we weren’t allowed to. Because the only time that I spoke to him was that, as I said, when we were waiting for the prosecution to rest, so we were holed up in the back room somewhere in the back, because we were there, there were eyes on us, so we weren’t allowed to talk about what the goings on, so we just small talked, talked about other stuff.

CT:  What about after you had testified?

BB: I think that his sister and his mom were on the same day as us, but my parents, my mom and my sister were the next day, because I went back to the courtroom for them but just stayed in the back again. They were the only times that I really spoke to him. I never spoke to him at the ranch or any time after that.

CT:  Okay. How long did you stay at the ranch then? Around the trial?

BB: About three weeks in total.

CT:  Were you there for three weeks before you testified and then you left? At what, what point in the trial do you think you would’ve arrived and left? Were you gone by the verdict?

BB: Uh, yeah, definitely. I was back home.

CT:  Okay. In the three weeks that you were there did Michael seem to deteriorate? What did he seem to be pretty steady?

BB: Uh, he was pretty steady. I didn’t see him really deteriorate. He was just, as I said real frail, and you could tell that he was going through it.

CT:  So what was your memory of the verdict? Were you watching on TV?

BB: No, I was asleep at the time. My sister called me up. She woke me up, called on the phone and she, um, was crying and I was like, what’s wrong? []

I thought it was something bad. She’s like, “No”, it turns out they were happy tears. He’s being found not guilty. And so then I went and turned on the TV straight away. Yeah, it was just such, it was like all this emotion poured out because it was just such, such a relief.

CT: When did you next speak to Michael after the verdict?

BB: I think it was… again I don’t really recall because it was such a frequent thing for me to do, it’s not something that I paid attention to, so I don’t remember it being too soon after, but not too far after. So it probably would’ve been a few months.

A VISIT TO BAHRAIN

CT: Did you ever actually see him in person again after the trial?

BB: Yeah, I went to Bahrain in 2006.

CT: Oh, wow. Okay. So tell us about that. How did Michael seem?

BB:  He was … from having seen him going through it during the trial to seeing him then – he was a lot more like he used to be. He was, um, definitely more upbeat. He was actually real positive about the future, like he said he was doing a lot of good things that were happening. I never really heard details of any business dealings or anything that he was planning or anything of doing, but he would always allude to stuff and say he [wished] those big things coming.

So yeah, there was a lot of that happening. He was, he was having heaps of meetings. Um, he was looking to buy out there as well. Buy a place out there. Yeah, it was, it was really cool.

CT: Was it just you or was it you and your family in Bahrain?

BB:  No, it was just me at that time. It was actually because I was going through a little bit of something in my personal life. And so I was, um, a little bit, uh, unhappy at the time and … He always was calling and stuff. It was actually mom [who] said to him that I was a little bit going through something. So he flew me out there to, um, try and make things better.

CT: How long were you there for?

BB:  About three weeks.

CT: Did it make things better?

BB:  Yeah. Of course it did. [both laugh]

CT: How did that… how did he help?

BB:  Just, um, as I said, with a skewed perspective… not skewed, but a different perspective on life to see what all life had, what opportunities people have in life, to see how far people can go and just to be part of that upper echelon of, of being, being the person that he is. It was just so life-giving.

It was, it was real refreshing. I don’t know what he… I am on a different vibrational level or something. I don’t l know what it is, but it’s that magnetic effect that I was talking about before, how everyone wanted to be around him 24/7. It’s just something that he gives off, that you can’t be anything, you can’t be anything but happy after being around him.

CT: Yeah. Again, it’s, um, it stands in stark contrast to the narrative, which is pedaled about Michael befriending kids and then basically disregarding them or replacing them or dumping them.

BB:  Mm-hmm.

CT:  The fact that even, even as you were – how old would you have been by then – so you would’ve been in your mid twenties and you’re going through something?

BB:  Yeah. Yeah.

CT: I suppose it makes me wonder, there were people that did disappear from his life. Did you ever understand or hear about how and why certain people had actually ended up being pushed out of his circle? You were kept around, you had a long lasting friendship. Other people clearly have been left with the impression that they were cast out for some reason. Did you ever have any impression as to whether maybe there was a reason that people have been cast out?

BB: I’m not the type of person to… like I said, I live in the moment. Whatever is happening is happening. Whatever happens, it happens. Someone’s around, someone’s not, it’s not really my place or need to know why. It’s not something that ever crossed my mind. I was just happy to be there always, always.

So I really know what makes me so special. I really don’t know what makes me so special that, that I would have been someone that, as you say, was kept in the inner circle while others were pushed out, I don’t know why. That is the case. I don’t know why people were pushed out. My assumption would only be, I can only go off what my perspective or my experiences were, but I was never one to take advantage of the situation.

Let’s just say like, I would, we would go to toy stores and, and he would let me buy stuff, but it was never like, oh, I want this, I need this, can I have this, can I do this, can I meet this person, can I do this? And I never gave cause to him to never trust me.

So I guess that that’s what it would be. It would be more of a trust issue. I can only see that as a reason why, like he did something that happened where he wasn’t comfortable with, the way that this person acted. And this is just my assumption only, whether this person acted, or something they did, or something they said, or whatever it would have to be. That’s the only thing that I could see, that would have to be something like this, that they would have lost his trust or his belief in him or something. That’s the only reason why I would see that he would shut someone out, if that is the case.

CT:  What did his life seem to be like in Bahrain? Where was he? Was he living in a hotel or was he still with the prince?

BB:  No, he was in a house.

CT: Oh, okay.

BB:  It’s not really my position whose house is this. It was a beautiful place, really hot roofs, the ceilings are massive, the grounds are beautiful. It was a nice place. And it’s like in the middle of the desert, it’s such a surreal area of the world, you’ll see just sand dunes, but then these mansions with palm trees and green grass, and like there was a pool there, it was really cool.

CT: Did he seem happy?

BB:  He did. He did. The kids were there as well. It was really cool. It was really cool.

I SPOKE TO HIM A WEEK BEFORE HE PASSED

CT: How regularly would you say you were in touch with him in those final years after Bahrain?

BB:  Again, it’s not something that I recall the frequency of. I just know, because it’s always, it, it just always has been. So I can’t tell you the frequency between them, but it was definitely really regular. It’s not like I never spoke to him for years on end. It would’ve been the last time I spoke to him was a week before he passed.

CT: What do you remember speaking to him about on that occasion?

Goofing around (1992)

BB:  We would always, around that time, we would always reminisce about things that we did. Um, adventures we had, we went on places we’d gone.  “Do you remember this time? Do you remember doing that? Remember when that happened?”

Yeah, he was looking forward to doing the shows but I think that it was taking a lot out of him as well.

ST: Do you say that because he sounded tired or because he expressed any kind of concern about it?

BB:  Not really. He didn’t really express any kind of concern, but he definitely was tired. He definitely was tired.

CT: I think, when I spoke to you previously, you mentioned that actually you were supposed to be in London when the shows happened.

BB:  Yeah, I was supposed to, he told me he was going to fly me out to London.

CT: How did that conversation end? Do you remember it?

BB:  The last time?

CT: Yeah.

BB:  No, not really. I was just seeing, like it was just like any other normal conversation. I didn’t know what was … what was about to happen.

CT: So how did you find out about Michael’s passing?

BB:  It happened when I was um… again it was another thing when I was asleep because of the time difference over here. I was living at home at the time, maybe a little too past my prime to be living at home, but that’s another story. Yeah, I was asleep, mom came in my room and because I had a missed call from someone. Actually someone had called, because my mobile phone was on the bedside table next to me, somebody called it and I saw who it was and I just um ignored it because I was so sleepy. And this person was not someone who would be calling me at that time usually, so that’s why I was just like I’ll call that person back later and then went back to sleep.

And then mom came in and told me, and then I didn’t believe it, turned on TV and I just, yeah…… it was not …. (his voice breaks)… it was a very sad day.

CT: How did you react immediately? I mean, I know a lot of people who actually just assumed, you know, that it was fake news. I mean, it had been reported by the media previously that Michael had passed away and it had been incorrect. I mean, what was your immediate reaction to the news? Did you believe it?

BB:  No, but then when I was watching the TV, I did. It’s yeah, I just didn’t want to believe it. That’s really all I am going to add to that.

CT: Did you go out for either of the funerals, either the Staple Center Memorial or the actual funeral?

BB:  No, I didn’t…  The thing about the way that … (sighs), and I guess it’s one of the reasons, getting back to why I was always around… Well honestly, it’s not just me, it’s my whole family. We never pushed the point, never took advantage, never did anything like that.

So our only real dealings, especially personally, my only real dealings, like I was his friend and his friend only. So once he passed there was no real way for me to…  Because he was always the one, which I’m extremely grateful for, because he paid for it every time I went anywhere, anytime I did anything, he was always the one that would pay for it, because we don’t have the means to do stuff like that of course, because we’re just absolutely regular people.

So when he passed, there was no real way for me to go over there, to reach out to someone because I didn’t know anyone’s contacts. So there was no real way for me to go across there. And to tell you the truth, I don’t handle death real well, so I’m not sure how I would have gone if I had gone.

CT:  Is there any part of you that wishes you had gone?

BB:  Yeah, absolutely. Like I haven’t been back since 2005 when we went for trial, I haven’t been back to the States since then.  It’s something that I’d definitely like, I would love to do, but I’m not sure if I want to either, at the same time, so there is a part of regret that I didn’t, but for me it wouldn’t have… my grief wouldn’t have been any easier or anything, if I had gone over there if you know what I mean, if that makes sense.

CT: As part of preparing for this interview, I did go back over your Twitter history and I noticed that you do make a point every year of posting about, you know, the anniversary or posting about Michael’s birthday. You know, you leave little messages to him on Twitter. Would you say that you’re still grieving?

BB:  Yeah, absolutely. But it’s the same thing, like I still grieve my grandparents’ death. He was, he was really a member of the family.

CT: Has it made it more difficult to cope with the loss of Michael to see what has happened since he passed away in terms of the resurfacing of the allegations and particularly the fact that your name continually comes up, does that make it more difficult for you?

BB:  Absolutely. That’s not how I want to be associated with it.

MY CLEAR CONSCIENCE WILL GIVE ME COMFORT

CT:   On May the 8th, 2013 I noticed this as I was going back through your twitter…

BB:  Okay. Stalker (laughs)

CT: (laughs too). But I prefer the term diligent researcher.

(both laugh)

CT: On the 8th of May, 2013 TMZ broke the news that Wade Robson was now claiming he had filed a suit for money saying that Michael had, um, abused him. And on the same day you published a tweet and it said “I wish people would realize, in your last moments on this earth all of the money in the world will be of no comfort. My clear conscience will”.

Brett Barnes, May 8, 2013

I just want to get into it with you briefly.  You are exceptionally clear that nothing ever happened between you and Michael.  But what is it that convinces you that nothing happened to anyone else either?

BB:  I guess that is a brash statement for you to make. But my viewpoint on the matter is that I spent a great deal of time with him up until he’s passing. For most of my life he was… he was a part of my life and my experiences with him for that great amount of time… for nothing, for nothing to not only ever happened to me, for me to have not seen anything that would cause me concern to have happened to anyone else.

And no one had spoken to me. I’ve been around a lot of people around him, and for no one to have said anything to me. Not to say that anyone would, but the reason I say this is that I have never had any perception that anything, uh, bad was happening.

So for me to have been spending all this time, and I guess it is only the time that I was spending around, so I can only comment on that and then projecting it on to the rest of his life. There’s no way that I could see it happening, that him doing anything, um, bad, to anyone happening. So there’s that viewpoint of it that I can’t see him doing anything.

But for me as well, to put my foot down and stamp it is more of a loyalty thing than for him to have these accusations about him. That’s my friend that’s having this happen to.

THE “PATTERNS”

CT: Well, I suppose the other thing is that where the allegations, where there are allegations where Michael is concerned, there are also almost inextricably allegations of a pattern, of a pattern of grooming and of a pattern of abuse.  And certainly in the TV show “Leaving Neverland” they associate you with that pattern. So it is their case that there was a pattern and that you were part of that pattern.

And so I just want to put to you some of what is said about you in “Leaving Neverland” because the people that made it never gave you the opportunity to comment on it. So I thought maybe we should afford you that opportunity.

BB:  Mm-hmm.

CT:  So the first mention of you, you are not mentioned by name, but you are shown in archive footage and photographs. So James Safechuck is speaking…

BB: (breaks in) Did you notice how, sorry, sorry to cut you off there. Did you notice how there were montages or not montages, but photos of other people around, but only my face is clear, everyone else’s is blurred out? But sorry, continue.

CT:  Yes. Um, so there’s, so James Safechuck is talking over footage in photographs of you and Michael.

BB:  Yep.

CT: And he says, this is his verbatim quote:

“There was one particular boy who sort of entered and replaced me. And so I saw him grow closer and closer to that boy. And I was pushed out more and more, and that was really difficult to handle. One specific night that was really tough. It was at the Avenue of the Stars, you know, spending the night there and the boy was there and the boy would sleep in Michael’s room. And then I would sleep downstairs on the sofa. It’s like being cast out. And it was like a realization that like, okay, I’m not number one. And I just wanted to go home. Michael is my, like, partner. And then he’s gone”.

So all this stuff about the particular boy who replaced me and is now sleeping in Michael’s room and I’m downstairs on the sofa – this is, I mean, this is all being said over footage and photographs of you.

BB:  Mm-hmm.

CT:  I mean, was it your impression that you were replacing anybody?

BB:  Not at all. Not at all.

CT: When he says Avenue of the Stars, would that be referring to the, um, the Hideout?

BB:  I would assume so.

CT: So did the Hideout have an upstairs and a downstairs?

BB:  Uh, yeah. It was three levels – the garage was down the bottom, middle level was like a lounge room and kitchen and then upstairs was a games room again and bedroom.

CT:   Oh, I see. I would be my reading, just reading through this:

“There was a particular boy who entered and replaced me. I saw him grow closer and closer and I was pushed out. The boy was there and the boy would sleep in Michael’s room. Michael was my partner and then he’s gone”.

I mean that seems to be a very clear inference that you are Michael’s romantic partner which is something that you would expect somebody to give you a right of reply about, if they’re going to broadcast it on television all over the world, but they didn’t. Nobody asked you to, uh, to comment on that.

BB:  Mm-hmm.

CT: What would you have said if they had asked you to comment on that?

BB:  Yeah, it’s um, absurd. I can’t see how that would’ve taken place. It completely… it doesn’t make sense to me at all. It didn’t happen and it doesn’t make sense to me that… that any aspect of our friendship could be described as such.

WADE’S MOM ANGRY.“My memory is in the entire time we’ve lived here since 1991, we’ve only been at the ranch with Michael on four occasions in 14 years. Every other time we’ve been here without him” – from Joy Robson’s testimony at the 2005 trial. [The photo is dated Sept.30, 2016]

CT:  So the show continues. Wade Robson’s mother Joy Robson says during the Dangerous tour where Michael took Brett Barns on the tour with him, Wade had asked to go on the tour and Michael had told him no, he couldn’t go because he wasn’t allowed to take children on this tour. And then he saw Brett Barns with him on television, and then it comes to Wade and he says,

“I don’t think he liked to mix us”. I mean, he liked to keep these relationships separate. I remember it being particularly hard with Brett because I found out and I knew that he was Australian. Oh, it’s a new Australian boy as well. Like feeling really replaced.”

Is it true that Michael kept kids separately from one another?

BB:  No. I was never, like I said, I was never locked away, there was never anything.

As I said, I spent time with Jordy, spent time, only a little bit of time with Wade. There’s been his cousins who have been around, other friends have been around, there’s always been people around.

CT: Macaulay Culkin also. I think you testified in 2005 that he actually stayed in the room…

BB:  Yeah.

CT: …with you and Michael on occasion.

BB:   I think so, he was at the ranch one time.

CT: This bit where Wade says he found out that you were Australian and that Michael had replaced him with a new Australian boy – I mean it kind of is insinuating again that there’s some kind of … because Wade is alleging that he was abused when he says that he’s been replaced with a new boy, that is sort of alleging that you must have been abused as well.

BB:  Mm-hmm , that’s how I take it.

CT: So that’s your interpretation. I think that’s a reasonable person’s interpretation. So had “Leaving Neverland”s producers, makers bothered to give you any sort of, right of reply, what would you have said that?

BB:  I absolutely refute it, it’s not …. Again I don’t understand this term “replacement”. Because my understanding of being friends with someone is that you’re friends with that person, and there’s nobody that’s going to take your place. You’re not taking the place of anybody else. It’s a friendship. I can’t fathom the idea that someone was being replaced. Because I was never replaced from what that statement is saying. But like I said, my friendship continued, would still be continuing to this date, so I can’t… I don’t understand the replacement part of things. There was no replacement.

CT: Let’s reiterate it again. Wade’s mother Joy says:

“After a while I realized there was a pattern. Every 12 months there was a new boy in his life”.

But you’re saying that there was no such pattern.

BB:  Not in my experience. There was no disruption to our friendship throughout the entire span of it. There was none. I was never left out in the cold, there was, there was, there was nothing in our friendship for the whole time where I ever felt like I was being replaced, I ever felt slighted by him. And maybe it’s just my perspective that I was happy to be there. I don’t know, but that’s never anything that I felt from his side of things, that I was ever, that I wasn’t his friend anymore, I wasn’t a “favorite” of his, there was never anything like that.

THE PATTERN CAN BE REVERSED

CT: I think that what’s important about this is that they are pointing to you as evidence of the pattern. So there is to some extent a pattern in the sense that you were all the children of families who actively sought out Michael Jackson, because you were fans and you all, at some point became a bit like surrogate families and you all were invited to Neverland or to participate in music videos, or go on tour or whatever.

BB:  Mm-hmm.

CT: And you all ended up staying with him in his room at some point. And so their contention is that this is a grooming pattern, which is extremely similar. And so what they are saying is if we say we were abused, then Brett must have been abused. That seems to be what they’re saying, because it’s the same pattern.

BB:  Which I guess is the [illegible].  It’s the exact opposite. It’s the same thing but from a different perspective, on my side of things.

CT: Exactly. Yes.

BB:  It never happened to me, so it couldn’t have happened to anyone else.

CT: Yes, so that’s what I wanted to put to you really, if they are pointing to you and saying you are proof of the pattern, then you feel it’s reasonable for you to say, well, actually nothing happened to me. And therefore I feel it’s reasonable for me to believe that probably nothing happened to you. That’s essentially where you are coming from.

BB:  That’s my viewpoint, yes.  And, but like I said, I can’t … I can only comment on what my perspective of what I’ve experienced. I can’t comment on what happened when I wasn’t there, but I can make a reasonable judgment in my opinion.

CT:  Yes. So, and your opinion, I take it, is that you don’t believe that Michael ever did abuse any children.

BB:  I couldn’t, I can never… I could never see him doing anything bad to another human being, let alone a child.

~

Robson&Safechuck: “We say that we were abused, so Brett must have been abused too”                                                       Brett Barnes: “But it never happened to me, so it couldn’t have happened to anyone else.”

~

Oh my God, how refreshingly new and true this last maxim is!

When Brett says that the usual pattern imposed on us from every corner can actually be reversed and mean exactly the opposite, he hits the nail on the head.

Why don’t many of us realize that when hundreds of people who had personal experience with Michael Jackson knew him to be a decent, honorable and innocent person, and only a couple of opportunists call him guilty as sin, the pattern is not on the opportunists’ side and actually points to them being phony as a three-dollar bill?

And if the Barnes family was indeed invited to be Michael Jackson’s guests for 365 days in two years in a row, why did Michael prefer to innocently spend so much time with them and not with Wade Robson who claims that he was abused right at that time?  Though his words definitely contradict his own mother’s complaints that MJ didn’t take Wade on a tour and during the many times they visited Neverland, Michael was there on four occasions only?

All of it is worth a serious thought, so let’s wrap it up for now and leave it until the next time.