Michael Jackson (110 page)

Something about this story didn’t sit right with me. Maybe it was the conspiracy charge – the allegation that a gaggle of Michael’s
cohorts kept the Arvizos at Neverland against their will at Michael’s behest. That seemed ridiculous to me. My feeling was
that if the district attorney concocted that charge, and it seemed to me that he had, what else in his case was fiction? If
I couldn’t believe the conspiracy charge, could I believe the rest of the charges of giving alcohol to minors and sexual molestation?
But more than that, the so-called ‘rebuttal video’ was troubling. In it, Gavin and his family were seen praising Michael Jackson
beyond all reason while insisting that he was not capable of doing anything inappropriate with a child, and that anyone who
thought so after watching the Bashir documentary was very wrong. And they were adamant about it, too. However, to explain
it, the prosecution claimed the whole thing had been scripted and the Arvizos had been forced to say what they said.

Whatever the case, I felt certain that District Attorney Tom Sneddon hated the idea of having to play that video for the jurors.
After all, it made his case against Jackson look very suspect. The fact that he was in possession of this video and still
went ahead with his prosecution made me question his motives. In fact, it made me think he had it in for Michael Jackson,
maybe because he was never able to prosecute him for what he believed happened between him and his first accuser, Jordan Chandler,
ten years earlier. In my opinion, once he saw the video of the Arvizos singing Michael’s praises, he should have just said,
‘Case closed. These people are probably liars. And even if I’m not absolutely sure they’re liars, they just
might
be liars and that’s reason enough not to proceed with the ruination of another man’s life.’

The worst day, though, was the one we members of the press privately called ‘Porn Day’. That was the day – and it may have been
more than one, I can’t recall perhaps because I’ve tried to block it – the prosecution showed, on an enormous screen, pornographic
images of magazines found at Neverland. It was awful. I remember sitting there watching Michael’s mother, Katherine – a devout
Jehovah’s Witness – as she was forced to look at the lurid display. I just remember the back of her head being very still, as
if frozen in place. (At one point I believe I remember her not appearing at all for one of the sessions.) None of it was gay
porn, though. None of it was kiddie porn. So why show it? The prosecution suggested that it was straight porn used by Michael
to turn on young heterosexual kids so that he could then have sex with them. It didn’t make sense to me. And why show so many
images? One magazine, maybe. Two? Maybe. But stacks of them? I wasn’t even sure they were Michael’s, to tell you the truth.
In my mind, it seemed like a manoeuvre to destroy him and his family.

At the end of the day, Randy Jackson looked at me as he left the courtroom and gave me a thumbs-up and a big smile. It seemed
odd under the circumstances. But I returned the gesture. That evening I went back to my room and thought about that moment
with Randy. It seemed somehow familiar to me. And then I remembered that almost thirty years earlier, Randy had been in an
automobile accident and doctors said he would never walk again. At a press conference at the hospital, they rolled the young
eighteen-year-old Randy Jackson out in a wheelchair, both legs in a cast. They said he would never walk again. I remember
feeling sick about it. What a tragedy. And I remember that Randy looked at me standing among the other members of the press
and gave me a thumbs-up and a big smile. Of course, Randy not only walked again, Michael said he danced and went on with his
life in remarkable fashion. Say what you will about the Jacksons, hope springs eternal for that family – and maybe with good
reason.

I’ll never forget another moment at the trial. It was one of the many days Michael hobbled by me, smiled and nodded his recognition.
I smiled back. And as he passed, I remember that he smelled like old, musty clothing. It was as if he was a wax figure in
a museum, and one that had been there too long and was in need of care and attention. Later, one of the other reporters came
over to me and said, ‘You’re putting your objectivity in jeopardy by smiling at the defendant. People are going to think you’re
on his side.’ I shrugged my shoulders. ‘Yeah, well... ’ I muttered as I walked away. I thought it was a little late to be
concerned about objectivity, especially after ‘Porn Day’.

I have so many memories of that infamous trial. Sometimes they hit me in waves when I least expect it, especially since Michael’s
death.

For instance, I remember the day Gavin’s mother, Janet Arvizo, testified. Her testimony on 13 April 2005 was so preposterous,
so unlikely – what with her allegation that she believed Michael was going to kidnap her children and take them away in a hot
air balloon – many of us in the press corps actually began to feel as if we’d been duped. After all, we’d spent months before
the trial at court hearings in Santa Maria about evidence that had been sealed. We had no idea what the DA had on Jackson,
we just knew it had to be pretty bad. But the testimony thus far provided by the DA seemed weak and inconsistent, and when
Janet Arvizo came to town with her quirky manner, it became clear to a lot of people that this wasn’t such a cut-and-dry case.
Could it be that Michael was being set up by a family intent on making money, maybe, or a DA determined to finally nail him?
After Janet’s testimony, one CNN reporter came over to me and said, ‘You know what, pal? I feel so...so...
used
.’ It was as if he’d been promised something by a suitor and been betrayed. A friend of mine named Michael Lawler – an ardent
Jackson admirer who had followed the proceedings so closely he knew the evidence better than even I did – had flown in from
New York to attend the trial. I helped him get into the courtroom for Janet’s testimony. He was so disgusted by it that he
couldn’t help but mutter something derogatory under his breath. Overheard by the officials, he promptly got tossed right out
of the courtroom. ‘The next time you help someone get into here,’ a sheriff deputy told me later, ‘you’d better tell him to
keep his trap shut even if the witnesses are crazy as freaking loons.’

I also well remember the day Bob Jones testified, the twenty-ninth day of testimony.

I had known Bob since I was ten years old and had more than thirty years of history with him. He was a formidable man. As
head publicist at Motown and later the man in charge of Michael’s PR, he was the person I had to clear in order to get to
Diana Ross, The Supremes, The Temptations, The Jackson 5 and all of the other Motown stars when I wanted to do interviews
and features about them. He never made it easy, either. He could be incredibly intimidating and combative. He was also, at
heart, a big softy. I can’t count the number of favors we did for each other, mostly involving me writing about some obscure
Motown artist not one person on the planet cared about in exchange for an interview with a true legend like Stevie Wonder
or Smokey Robinson.

When Bob Jones left Motown to work for Michael Jackson, he made it tough for all of us in the press to get to Michael, as
we expected would be the case. He’d known Michael since the pop star was eight, so of course he was protective of him. However,
when there was a press day or some other function at Neverland, we’d all find ourselves in a bus together headed out there
to cover the event. I remember him once telling me, ‘If I see you take even one picture on the property, I’ll throw you into
the lake with my own two hands.’ And he meant it, too.

Bob left Michael’s employ in 2004 after almost seventeen years – not counting all the years at Motown – in what seemed an unfair
way, by letter, not even a phone call. Michael just wrote him off and abandoned him for reasons that are still unclear to
me and, it seems from talking to Bob about it, to him as well. Then Bob wrote a scathing book about Michael with reporter
Stacy Brown. Even I was shocked by it, and I don’t shock easily when it comes to this subject matter. Of course, the prosecution
loved every rage-fueled word, especially in regard to Jordie Chandler, the boy Michael was accused of having molested in 1993.
And before the book was even officially published, they put Bob on the witness stand to face his former employer and tell – under
oath – some of the stories about Michael and Jordie that were in his book. What must it have been like for Bob to look out from
the witness stand and stare into Michael’s eyes after having written such a book? Whatever his feelings, in terms of doing
what was expected of him, Bob couldn’-t – or wouldn’-t – pull it off for the prosecution. He’d spent so many years protecting – and
loving – Michael Jackson, he simply couldn’t do it. He acted – or maybe it wasn’t acting, I’m not sure to this day – as if he hadn’t
even read the book, let alone written it with Stacy. ‘I don’t recall seeing any head lickin’,’ Bob said when asked about a
particularly strange passage in his own book. (I have to admit, that became a favorite line for a lot of us in the media.)

Tom Sneddon never really broke Bob Jones – no one was ever able to do that, not to my knowledge, anyway. Bob left the witness
stand after not saying anything very damaging about Michael. In fact, in some ways, I felt he sacrificed his own dignity for
Michael that day, maybe his final gift to his former friend and employer. He didn’t seem to care that the DA had made him
look like a liar, as long as he didn’t betray Michael Jackson on that witness stand. Still, I had a sinking feeling that,
as far as Michael was concerned, Bob was dead to him now anyway. Bob died a couple of years later without ever reconciling
with Michael.

On that same day, June Chandler – Jordie’s mother – testified. She spoke of the gifts Michael gave her and the pleading and begging
he did to allow him to spend time with Jordie ten years ago. She looked so devastated as she spoke about the way her relationship
with her son had been ruined – she hadn’t spoken to him in eleven years, by his decision – and how much she regretted ever having
trusted Michael with her son. She said that Michael lavished her with all sorts of expensive presents in order that she trust
him and, maybe by extension, allow her boy to spend private time with him, on at least thirty occasions!

When I wrote about the Jordie Chandler business as it unfolded in 1993 and 1994, I was never certain what to think about it.
Michael had been so adamant in my interviews with him at the time – anguished telephone calls from abroad – that he was not guilty,
it was difficult for me to accept that he was that good a liar. Also, I had many credible sources who felt certain that Michael
was being blackmailed, that he was innocent. But some of the stories in which Jordie was concerned were so disturbing, I wasn’t
sure what to make of them. Where Gavin Arvizo was concerned, however, I came to the conclusion that Michael wasn’t guilty
based on testimony presented in court. But when it came to Jordie Chandler, I wasn’t as certain. How could I be?

Many of Michael’s fans and family members have been angry with me over the years for not being unequivocal about Michael’s
innocence where Jordie Chandler was concerned. I understand that they feel Michael’s denials to me in interviews should have
been enough to convince me, and of course his commentary about it went a long way. But the fact of the matter is that I was
never in the same room with Michael and Jordie. How could I know for sure what went on between them? And, most important – unlike
the situation with Gavin – I wasn’t presented with more than sixty days of sworn testimony to help me make up my mind. I wanted
to believe that Michael was innocent of any wrongdoing with Jordie Chandler, of course. I hoped that was the case. But that
doesn’t necessarily make it so. In the end, in my view, blind faith is a wonderful thing reserved only for family members
and very, very close friends. The rest of us just have hope – and that’s not the same as knowledge.

Then there was the small fact that Michael paid Jordie more than $25 million. Certainly that didn’t help clear his name, as
far as I was concerned. I remember interviewing Michael right after the settlement was made and telling him that I was extremely
disappointed that he’d paid the Chandlers so many millions. I told him that from that moment on, people would always believe
he was guilty as charged. It was the first time I’d ever heard Michael swear. ‘I don’t give a [expletive deleted] what people
think,’ he told me angrily. He said that the litigation had ruined his life, that he was absolutely innocent but that he also
had the money to make the whole thing go away. It was the first time, I thought, Jackson didn’t make a decision with an eye
toward how it would play out in the public arena. In some ways, I remember thinking it was a defining moment for him. I wondered
if maybe all of the image-making days were behind him and I hoped he’d now be able to lead a more authentic life. Maybe he
didn’t do it after all, I mused, and he just wanted to get on with his life and forget that the Chandlers ever existed. But
then, ten years later, I sat studying June Chandler on the witness stand, this shell of a woman with dead eyes. She looked
as if her whole world had come crashing down around her the day she and her boy met Michael Jackson. And I wasn’t sure what
to think. She was, I felt, the prosecution’s strongest witness, and not so much because of what she said – it wasn’t much, actually – but
because of how she appeared while saying it. Ruined. Totally destroyed by the circumstances of her son’s relationship with
the King of Pop.