Jackson licked child's head
2005-04-11 20:14
Santa Maria - Michael Jackson's longtime publicist reluctantly conceded on Monday he once saw the superstar embracing and licking the head of a young boy who later accused him of molestation.
Bob Jones, the accused star's spokesperson from 1987 until late 2004 when he left and wrote a book about his life with the faded "King of Pop", said he saw the bizarre licking scene on a flight from Paris to Los Angeles in the 1990s.
But the witness called by prosecutors trying to convict Jackson at trial for allegedly abusing a 13-year-old cancer survivor two years ago appeared reticent to dig the dirt on his boss of 30 years.
"I do not remember any head licking" involving a boy who in 1994 won a settlement worth more than $20m from Jackson, Jones told trial jurors.
But prosecutor Gordon Auchincloss eventually got Jones to admit that he wrote an e-mail to his co-author Stacy Brown in which he said he saw Jackson lick the boy's head.
In the electronic missive, Jones said that he felt "licking was going to be important, because he (Jackson) did it in this case too." Jones conceded that if he wrote that, it must be true.
Prosecutors have said that Jackson licked the head of now 15-year-old boy shortly before he allegedly abused him in February or Mach of 2003.
They claim that the incident, which is not the object of any charges, took place during a flight from Florida to Jackson's Neverland Ranch in California.
Jones also admitted under pressure from the prosecutor that he saw Jackson and the boy who accused him 12 years ago entwined in a sleepy embrace as the flew back from the World Music Awards in Monte Carlo during which the boy had sat on the pop icon's lap.
"They were embraced into one another ... sleeping on the airplane from Paris to Los Angeles," he said of the incident involving the then 12-year-old boy in late 1992.
'Romantic couple'
He also conceded that he had written a paragraph in the manuscript of his upcoming book in which he said Jackson and the boy seemed like a romantic couple.
"I looked at what was going on with the king and the boy: they were holding each other tightly .. almost in a romantic sense .. cooing - there were pecks on the cheek and licks on the top of the head," he wrote of the flight.
But under cross examination by Jackson lead lawyer Thomas Mesereau, he said that while he had been concerned about the boy sitting on Jackson's lap during the show from a public relations point of view, the star had not acted covertly.
Jackson was seated in the front row of the theatre between Prince Albert of Monaco and Dynasty actress Linda Evans.
Legal analyst Jim Moret said that Jones' testimony was crucial to the prosecution because it is so similar to the allegations that Jackson licked his current accuser before abusing him.
"The prosecution is trying to lay a foundation for a pattern of behaviour," he said.
- AFP