Michael Jackson (109 page)

What other famous person has these kinds of problems? Is it that Michael is so different, so unusual, so extraordinary, so…
famous
… that he is an easy target for one kind of exploitation or another, be it one of the many hundreds of lawsuits filed against
him or, now, a second allegation of child molestation? Or, does he somehow bring such madness onto himself by being arrogant,
or naïve… or both? Perhaps he is just one of the unluckiest people ever to be in show-business? You have to feel sorry for
the guy.

However, one fact still remains: despite his background – his childhood fame and adult superstardom – at the end of the day it
is not reductive of who he is and the challenges he faces to remember that Michael Jackson is only human, no more than the
nine-to-five worker trying to support a large family on a meagre wage and no less than the wealthy socialite without a care
in the world. Like everyone who draws breath, he is ultimately responsible for making his own decisions. He’s a grown man – not
a child. He writes his own story, bringing into focus the characters he chooses to have in his world. No one forced Jordie
Chandler and his father on him, and no one forced Gavin Arvizo and his mother on him, either. Casting those people to play
roles in his life has amounted to some of Michael’s biggest mistakes, of that there is little doubt.

It’s sad – tragic, even. He’s such a privileged person, a man heaped with every blessing of fame, fortune and family. One wonders
why there seems no way then, no way at all, for Michael Jackson to lead a good and dignified – and happy – life.

It hit me while I was standing in Michael Jackson’s kitchen eating a tuna sandwich. I’ll never forget the moment, which was
as strange and surreal as one might imagine. It had been a week and one day since his sudden death on 25 June 2009. I had
spent practically every moment doing television interviews and reporting the terrible story for CBS News, the television network
for which I had covered Jackson’s molestation trial four years earlier. However, this time, it was different. The King of
Pop was gone. He was dead. It seemed unfathomable to me, yet somehow, it was true. Still, since I had so much work to do I’d
been trying to suppress my heavy emotion and complete the many jobs at hand. I found myself standing in Neverland’s exquisite
gourmet kitchen with its steel appliances and fine, antique wood finishes because I was asked to conduct a tour of the famous
estate for a CBS-TV broadcast. And it was while standing there eating that sandwich that it finally hit me. This is it, I
realized. Michael is gone, forever. The sinking feeling in my stomach that I’d tried to ignore for a week gave way to almost
overwhelming despair. It seemed unbelievably unfair. I looked out from the kitchen toward the expansive outdoor patio – the
meandering brook, the enormous trees and, of course, the figurines of little children playing – and I tried to conjure up the
laughter and music that once filled this cavernous space, the happy times.

Neverland Ranch was one of Michael Jackson’s greatest creations, the result of his imagination gone wild. He loved it here,
and no wonder; it’s truly breathtaking. In many ways, Michael really had it made, I thought to myself as I took a look around.
He was so blessed to live here. His entire life, in fact, was one of unbelievably good fortune. So how did it go so wrong
for him? When did it happen? Obviously, many things had gone awry, and I had recounted the wrong turns in great detail over
the years. But what was it about this place that seemed to bring all of the chaos into focus for me?
What was it?
In this very kitchen, I decided,
that’s
where it went wrong. And over there, in the breakfast nook – which is really about as large as most people’s living rooms – it
went wrong there, too.

I walked into the breakfast nook, stood in the center of the room and took a look around. It was completely empty – as was the
rest of the house – but the memories remained.

It was in these very rooms in November of 2003 that Michael Jackson introduced the world to a young boy named Gavin Arvizo,
first in the kitchen and then the breakfast nook. He smiled at the youngster and gazed wistfully into a television camera
for a Martin Bashir documentary and asked, ‘Why can’t you share your bed?’ Gavin, seeming totally enchanted by the pop star,
rested his head on Michael’s shoulder. ‘The most loving thing you can do is share your bed with someone,’ Michael continued.
But after Bashir pressed the issue, Michael tried to clarify it. It was almost as if it had suddenly occurred to him that
his comments could be misconstrued. ‘Always give the beds to the company, you know?’ he said, now sounding a lot like his
mother, Katherine, known to be the consummate hostess. ‘He [Gavin] was gonna sleep on the floor and I said no, you sleep on
the bed and I’ll sleep on the floor.’ When Bashir pressed as to why Gavin couldn’t sleep in one of the guest units, Michael
said, ‘Yes, but whenever kids come here they always want to stay with
me
. They never want to stay in the guest units, and I have never invited them in my room. They go, can I stay with you tonight?
I say, if it’s okay with your parents, yes you can.’

As I walked into Michael’s living room, I found myself staring at the fireplace and wondering... what if? What if he hadn’t
said those words on national television? What if he had had more sense, especially after the allegations of ten years earlier?

But was it so bad, really? Yes, it was, I decided at the time. Maybe now, looking back on it – knowing all we know and having
been so inundated with nauseating testimony as a result of the subsequent trial – it seems almost inconsequential. But at the
time, when those words came tumbling from Michael Jackson’s mouth, yes, it was bad. It was defining. In fact, it was the one
moment that, without exaggeration, completely ruined his life. After the show was broadcast on 6 February 2003, certain children’s
protection agencies raised questions, and one thing led to another before, finally on 20 September, Jackson was charged and
arrested for child molestation.

If Michael had simply not taped that one segment with Gavin, I wondered, would he eventually have gotten into trouble somewhere
else down the line? Who knows? But as I walked back into the kitchen alone with my thoughts, I felt so incredibly sad for
him, for his family, for his friends and for everyone whose lives were affected by a single moment Michael probably viewed
as totally insignificant as it unfolded.

Indeed, what if... ?

Four years ago in the winter and spring of 2005 – 28 February through 4 June – I sat behind Michael Jackson in a courtroom in
Santa Maria, California. I’m pretty certain I was the only person present – other than his lawyers and his family members – who
had ever even met the defendant or any of the other Jacksons. How well I remember the first day Tito walked into the courtroom
to support his brother. Everyone in the press area turned and looked at me with raised eyebrows. I mouthed the word ‘Tito’
and they all then quickly jotted his name in their notes. They didn’t know who he was! It was pretty much the same with all
of the family members, who came in different configurations every day to support the most famous of the Jacksons.

At the beginning of the trial, Michael Jackson – then forty-six – seemed to be in very good shape. He would walk briskly into
court and, as we in the press watched, limber up by stretching his body as if he was getting ready for a performance or an
athletic event. It was interesting to watch his dancer’s body flex and relax, and I remember thinking that he looked as fit
as he did in his memorable videos for ‘Thriller’, ‘Billie Jean’, and ‘Beat It’. When he would turn and smile at his attorneys
or even the spectators, his charisma was strong and so evident to me. The magic was still there. He was still Michael Jackson,
I thought. People were mesmerised by him, and somehow awed just to be in his presence. And never was that more evident than
on 1 March 2005 – the second day of opening statements – when Michael’s lawyer, Tom Mesereau, played the controversial Martin
Bashir documentary for jurors, the very one that had gotten Michael into such trouble. As Michael’s music played and photos
of his amazing career flashed on the screen, heads began bobbing in the courtroom. People began to smile at one another. For
a moment, it was as if we weren’t even in a courtroom. We were transported to some other place – certainly a
better
place – while Michael’s familiar voice and music filled the room. I thought to myself,
This is going to be one very odd molestation trial
.

Then the testimony began.

Day after day as the prosecution stated its case and paraded one witness after another who spoke of inappropriate behavior
between Michael and young boys, the pop star gradually seemed to fold inside of himself.

On the eighth day of testimony, 9 March 2005, Michael’s alleged victim, fifteen-year-old Gavin Anton Arvizo, testified. Wearing
a blue button-down shirt, he seemed nervous, mumbling at times. He recounted the times Michael gave him alcohol and said that
Michael had also masturbated him on two occasions. It was disturbing, to say the least. Michael stared straight ahead as if
a wax mannequin, displaying absolutely no emotion whatsoever.

The day after Gavin started his testimony, Michael was an hour late getting to court. After the judge issued a bench warrant
for him and threatened to throw him in jail, he finally showed up in pajamas. He’d had a serious back problem, it was explained,
and needed medical treatment. There was no time for him to change. It was obvious that things were not going well for him.
In fact, that bizarre day was pretty much the beginning of the end for Michael. The real story as I saw it – besides the unsettling
testimony – wasn’t the fact that he showed up in pajamas as much as it was that Michael seemed to be dying in front of our very
eyes. He was clearly in terrible pain, both physical and emotional. Anyone who cared about him would have been heartsick by
the sight. It was horrible to watch as he slowly deteriorated to the point where he could barely walk into the courtroom.

The prosecution’s case had it that twenty telephone calls between Michael and Gavin – which started when Jackson called him
in the hospital during the youngster’s cancer treatment – were followed by the first invitation to the Neverland Ranch. That
first night, according to Gavin, Michael suggested that he and his brother Starr sleep in Michael’s room. He told them to
ask their parents, they did, and it was agreed that they would sleep in Jackson’s bedroom rather than in a guest cottage.
That night they supposedly watched Internet porn together. ‘I thought he was the coolest guy in the world, my best friend
ever,’ Gavin said, ‘know what I mean? I really liked him?’

But then, out of the blue, Michael changed his phone number and abandoned the boys. That sounded like Michael to me. He could
be very capricious. He may have felt that Gavin was just a fan and that he’d given as much as he was going to give to him.
Still, from Gavin’s expression and demeanour on the witness stand, it was as if the boy felt betrayed, or maybe even jilted.
In fact, Gavin would testify about the time he was at Neverland and had been told that Michael was not present. But then Gavin
ran into him there. ‘It feels like my heart broke right there,’ he recalled, choked with emotion.

One day, according to the testimony, there was an unexpected telephone call asking Gavin and Starr to take part in the filming
of Martin Bashir’s documentary,
Living with Michael Jackson
. Then, after the documentary aired and caused a big sensation because of Michael’s misguided comments, Gavin and his family
were asked to take part in a rebuttal video intended to be used for damage control. Gavin, his two siblings – Starr and Davellin – and
mother, Janet, then met Michael in Florida, as he testified, and that’s when Michael supposedly gave him wine in a Diet Coke
can and called it Jesus Juice.

The sexual misconduct between Michael and Gavin was said to have taken place back at Neverland between 20 February and 12
March 2003 (again, after the airing of the Bashir documentary). As the story went, the Jackson camp then supposedly kept the
Arvizos under strict surveillance and effectively kidnapped them. (Tom Mesereau had a great line about this in his cross-examination
of Gavin’s brother Starr: ‘How many times did your family escape Neverland and then go back so you could escape again?’)

The climax of the Arvizo testimony would come in the video recording of Gavin’s questioning by Santa Barbara police, which
was shown to the jury in the last days of the trial. Gavin again described the five times he claimed Michael made him drink
alcohol and then abused him. ‘He said boys have to masturbate because if they don’t they go crazy,’ Gavin told the police.
‘He said that he wanted to show me how to masturbate. I said, “no”. He said he would do it for me. He grabbed me in my private
area. He put his hand in my pants... he started masturbating me. I told him I didn’t want him to do that... He kept on doing
it.’