However, in December of 1993 Michael was about to experience, if just for one day, what it might be like in the real world, where people often have to do things they may not necessarily want to do.
Upon Michael’s return to the United States, he was immediately served with a warrant for the long-threatened strip search by the police. According to the order, officers expected to examine, photograph and videotape Michael’s entire body, ‘including his penis, anus, hips, buttocks and any other part of his body. Michael Jackson should be notified,’ according to the order, ‘that he has no right to refuse the examination and photographs. Any refusal to cooperate with this order will be admissible in a court and an indication of his guilt.’ Also, it was explained to his attorneys that if he didn’t cooperate, the police would probably just arrest him on ‘probable cause’ and take him away in handcuffs, in front of photographers. This scenario was more than anyone in his camp could even fathom.
Apparently, Jordie had claimed that Michael had distinguishing marks on his genitals. He even drew a diagram of Michael’s penis on a napkin for police, and wrote on it: ‘Michael is circumcised. He has short pubic hair. His testicles are marked with pink and brown marks. Like a cow, not white but pink colour. He has brown patches on ass, on his left glut.’
The police were now determined to learn if Jordie’s description was accurate. If so, then he obviously had seen Michael Jackson unclothed.
The photo session, set for 20 December, promised to be as torturous an experience as Michael ever had in his life. Present from Santa Barbara would be its District Attorney, Thomas Sneddon, as well as a detective, photographer and a doctor. From Los Angeles, were Michael’s attorneys, Johnnie Cochran and Howard Weitzman, and Dr David Forecast, one of Michael’s physicians from the United Kingdom, as well as another detective and another photographer (employed by Michael), all of whom had arrived by helicopter.
After everyone arrived at Neverland, it took Johnnie Cochran and Howard Weitzman an hour to get Michael to leave his bedroom and go into the parlour, where the photos were to be taken. Finally, Michael came into the room, wearing a brown robe. It was agreed that his attorneys and Sneddon would leave the room and not be present for the photos. Bodyguard Bill Bray was allowed to remain, as would the two detectives and two photographers and two doctors.
As everyone was getting settled, Michael took a look at one of the detectives and, for no reason anyone could think of (except that he may have mistaken him for someone he knew), began shouting at him. ‘You! Get out! I don’t want you here for this. Get out!’ Michael then tried to storm from the room. However, one of the doctors grabbed him. ‘Hold on, Michael,’ he said, ‘hold on.’ Johnnie and Howard, upon hearing the ruckus, came back into the room. ‘Get these sons of bitches out of here,’ Michael screamed at them, now referring to everyone in the room. He was agitated beyond all measure and actually seemed high, though everyone present hoped that was not the case.
The District Attorney’s photographer, Gary Spiegel, began taking photographs of Michael while he was still seated on the couch. Michael blocked his face with his hands, as if thwarting a paparazzo.
Finally, an anguished Michael was told to stand on a platform in the middle of the room as if about to have his pants hemmed by a tailor. He was still wearing a bathrobe. ‘Please don’t make me do this,’ he said, his doe-like eyes watery. ‘This is terrible. Don’t make me.’
‘Sir, we have no choice,’ said one of the detectives.
Then, while standing on that platform and staring at a picture of Elizabeth Taylor on the wall, Michael took off the bathrobe. Under it, he wore a bathing suit.
‘You’ll have to take it off, sir,’ said the detective.
Still staring at the photograph of Elizabeth, Michael slipped the bathing suit off… under which he had on boxers.
‘Sir, please.’
Crying softly now, Michael slipped off the boxers and stood, naked, stripped not only of his clothing but of the one illusion he’d always had: that of his invincibility. All eyes went right to his penis, which did not appear to be circumcised.
‘Is the subject uncircumcised?’ asked the doctor. Everyone stepped in for a closer look.
‘Yes, he is…’
‘No, he’s not…’
‘Yes.’
‘No’
‘Oh my God,’ Michael whimpered. He looked dizzy, as if about to faint.
‘You don’t know?’ asked one of the detectives of Michael’s physician.
Michael’s medic became indignant. ‘Sir, I have never seen his penis before now.’
‘Well, the subject is clearly not circumcised,’ decided the other doctor, finally. He made a note of his finding.
As everyone circled him slowly, they began making other feverish notations about Michael’s body.
Yes, he did have patchy-coloured skin on his buttocks, as Jordie described.
Yes, he had short pubic hair.
Yes, his testicles were marked, pink and brown.
However, no matter how many different ways they looked at it, all seemed to agree that his penis was uncircumcised. But, did that matter? In fact, an uncircumcised penis can look circumcised when aroused. If Michael had been sexually excited when seen by Jordie, would anyone, let alone a thirteen-year-old know if he was circumcised or not? But there was now doubt about the identity of the person in question.
‘I then took several photographs of Jackson’s penis,’ said Gary Spiegel. ‘First the right side, then the left. When I was photographing the left side, the D.A.’s doctor told Michael Jackson to lift up his penis. He didn’t want to, so there was a lot of discussion about that. Finally he did it. Then, he angrily jumped off the platform. ‘That’s it,’ Jackson said. ‘That’s enough.’ He put on his robe and ran out of the room.’
The detectives looked at each other, one of them moved towards the room in which Michael’s attorneys had been waiting. Then, as the detective headed back into the living room, Michael’s lawyers stomped down the hall to get their client back before the waiting cameras. The cops were uncomfortable as they listened to what most would have guessed to be a rebellious teenager arguing loudly with strict, disappointed parents. Then, after fifteen minutes of cries, shrieks and pleas – silence. A moment later, the sound of one loud plaintive wail resonated through the house. Michael Jackson had been broken. He pounded his bare feet hard against the wood floor, moving towards the room he had worked so hard to make perfect for waiting guests.
‘When this whole thing is done, I want pictures of you,’ Michael said, pointing angrily at one of the photographers, ‘and you, too,’ he said, jabbing his finger at the other one.
Again, Michael stood naked. More pictures. Then, videotape.
‘Please,’ Michael said, his tone now pleading. ‘Can we stop now?’
One of the doctors pulled out a ruler.
‘That’s it,’ said Michael’s physician. ‘Mike, get dressed. This is a joke. I can’t believe it myself.’
Michael quickly put on his robe. ‘Don’t you ever, ever, ever let that happen again,’ he said, unleashing his anger on poor Bill Bray, who just sat in the corner the whole time looking mortified.
‘But I didn’t do nothin’, Mike,’ Bill said. ‘Why you hollerin’ at me?’
Ignoring Bill’s question, Michael stepped off the platform and ran from the living room. ‘How could this happen to me?’ he screamed on his way out. He was shaking. Observers said it looked as if he was about to have a melt-down. ‘How could this happen to me?‘ he kept repeating.
LaToya in Madrid
It was in the winter of 1993 that perhaps the most damaging blow of all to Michael Jackson’s image was struck, and it came from a family member: his own sister, LaToya. Though she had not seen or talked to him in a number of years, LaToya claimed to have exclusive information about Michael. As it happened, like many of Michael’s household employees who had sold stories to the tabloid press, LaToya and her husband, Jack, had their ow
n sliding scale of scandal: for a fee of $50,000 she would come forth with certain secrets about familial abuse that she had not yet revealed in her many interviews about the subject. However, for twice that, she would open up twice as much – and for a half-million she would throw caution to the wind and just come out and admit that Michael was a paedophile, and that she had proof to support her allegation.
The bidding war began with the British News of the World tabloid, who ponied up a substantial amount of money, only to be topped by the American National Enquirer and Star. However, during the course of the week, as editors pushed for details of LaToya’s revelations, negotiations collapsed. It became clear that she didn’t have much to offer, after all. Left without his planned windfall, Jack then arranged for LaToya to hold a press conference in Tel Aviv, Israel, where she was on tour.
‘Michael is my brother and I love him very much,’ she said, reading from a prepared statement, ‘but I cannot and will not be a silent collaborator in his crimes against young children. If I remain silent, then that means I feel the guilt and humiliation that these children are feeling, and I think it is very wrong. Forget about the superstar, forget about the icon. If he was any other thirty-five-year-old man who was sleeping with little boys, you wouldn’t like this guy.’
She also said that she had seen cancelled cheques made out to several boys for large sums of money, shown to her she said by her mother, Katherine, suggesting that Michael had bought their silence. She said that she sympathized with the children, ‘because I am a victim myself. When parents abuse their children, the children go on to be abusers themselves,’ she said. ‘Do you know how many children are going to psychiatrists because of Michael? So many, many children.’
The Jackson family, understandably upset by LaToya’s position, then hosted a press conference at their Encino estate. Distraught, Katherine said, ‘LaToya’s lying. I’ll tell her to her face she’s lying. I can’t believe I have a daughter out there saying these things to sell her brother down the river. She’s been brainwashed by her money-grabbing mongrel of a husband.’
For weeks to come, LaToya’s charges made big news, while she finally started making big money. That she is Michael’s sister gave her point of view special credibility; her stories did more damage to Michael than anything that had ever been charged by any housekeeper in his employ. From country to country, LaToya and Jack ventured forth, pitting television producers and newspaper editors against one another in bidding wars for her anecdotes about Michael. Meanwhile, family members continued to vilify LaToya. ‘But Michael supports the entire Jackson family, financially,’ LaToya said. ‘They have to support him.’
In December 1993 I was asked by the producers of a Spanish television show in Madrid called La Máquina De Mentira (The Lying Machine), to appear with LaToya and discuss with her the allegations she had made against Michael. As it was explained to me, LaToya would be hooked up to a lie detector machine. Then, I was to ask her questions about why she believed Michael was a paedophile. The television audience would be able to judge, by virtue of how LaToya fared on the test, the veracity of her observations.
Coincidentally, 22 December, the day we were in the studio and waiting to go on the air, was the same day Michael gave a four-minute speech from Neverland, first carried live by CNN and then rebroadcast all over the world.
‘I ask all of you to wait and hear the truth before you condemn me,’ he said, holding back tears. ‘Don’t treat me like a criminal, because I am innocent.’
Dressed in a red shirt with red lipstick, false eyelashes and long strands of hair framing his heavily made-up face, Michael had harsh words for the media which, he charged, ‘has dissected and manipulated these allegations to reach their own conclusions.’ He grew more emotional when describing the examination and subsequent photo session of his body: ‘I have been forced to submit to a dehumanizing and humiliating examination by the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department and the Los Angeles Police Department earlier this week. They served a search warrant on me which allowed them to view and photograph my body, including my penis, my buttocks, my lower torso, thighs and any other areas they wanted. They were supposedly looking for any discoloration, spotting blotches or other evidence of a skin colour disorder called Vitiligo, which I have previously spoken about.
‘It was the most humiliating ordeal of my life, one that no person should ever have to suffer. And even after experiencing the indignity of this search, the parties involved were still not satisfied and wanted to take even more pictures. It was a nightmare, a horrifying nightmare. But if this is what I have to endure to prove my innocence, my complete innocence, so be it.’
‘Don’t treat me like a criminal,’ Michael insisted, ‘because I am innocent.’
As LaToya stared at the TV screen, tears sprung from her large, expressive eyes. She seemed lost in thought until Jack Gordon burst into the room and laid waste to her reverie. ‘The show is off,’ he said. ‘I’m not allowing LaToya to be hooked up to any damn lie detector.’
‘Why?’ LaToya wanted to know.
‘We agreed on fifty thousand dollars,’ Jack explained. ‘But with Michael crying his eyes out on TV, I’m doubling her fee to a hundred thousand. I just told the producers, and they said to go to hell. So, we’re out of here. The hell with them.’
Jack grabbed LaToya by the arm.
‘I’m sorry you came all the way to Spain for nothing,’ she told me, looking victimized. ‘What a waste of time for you. You must think I’m a terrible person, now. But, really, I’m not.’ She was then hustled from the room by her husband. ‘Tell Michael I’m sorry,’ she said, while being whisked away.
Years later, LaToya would insist that the allegations she’d made against Michael were all Jack’s fabrications, which she was made to repeat against her will. Though it would take a few years, by 2003 she and Michael had cleared the air between them and were, again, close. LaToya also apologized to the rest of her family members; they then all accepted her back into the fold.
Michael Pays Up
By 1 January 1994, nearly two million dollars had been spent by prosecutors and police departments in California jurisdictions on the investigation of Michael Jackson. Two Grand Juries had questioned more than two hundred witnesses, including thirty children who had been friends of Michael’s over the years. Not one witness could be found who could corroborate Jordie Chandler’s story, and without other witnesses the authorities’ case against Michael was weak. Perhaps Michael had the undying loyalty of the youngsters with whom he’d had sex? Or, maybe all of those who had investigated the singer were inept? Or was it possible that he was innocent?
11 January marked Jordie’s fourteenth birthday, but he had no party. He wasn’t in the mood to celebrate, he said. When he blew out the candles on his cake, Evan asked him to make a wish. ‘I wish this nightmare would end,’ he said. As a gift, Evan gave him a bottle of mace, for his protection.
On that same day, more damage was done to Michael’s image when transcripts of depositions in the Jackson – Chandler civil suit were filed in Los Angeles Superior Court as part of a motion brought by attorney Larry Feldman. Arguing that he should be allowed access to Michael’s financial records since, as he put it, ‘there is substantial probability’ that his client would prevail in the suit, Feldman filed the transcripts as a demonstration of the evidence against Jackson. Also included was a new declaration from Jordie, who had repeated the original allegations he had made about Michael to police and social workers.
Transcripts filed by Larry Feldman included sworn depositions from Michael Jackson’s former chauffeur, former maids and secretaries. Truth or fiction, it didn’t matter; all of it was now a part of the public record. Composed mostly of hearsay, speculation and innuendo, and much of it from people who’d already been paid handsomely by tabloid television programmes and newspapers to ‘reveal all’ about their boss, it was difficult to imagine that such statements would have been given much credence by a jury.
No doubt, Jordie Chandler’s detailed testimony would have been the most damaging to Michael. One wondered, though, how a jury would have reacted to the fact that the original allegation, that Michael had touched his penis, was given while under a mind-altering drug? And what of the question of Michael’s being circumcised or not? In the end, it would be Michael’s word against Jordie’s, because there were no witnesses to any episodes of molestation (but, then again, there are rarely witnesses to such events).
Due to his celebrity status, it was possible that Michael could prevail at the civil trial. A mountain of circumstantial evidence (not to mention the impact that might be made on a jury by his wrong-minded determination to continually flaunt young boys in public) was probably not enough to secure a verdict against him. However, the question then was: was it worth it for him to find out? His attorneys didn’t think so, feeling that more harm than good would occur by having so many disclosures made public. Plus, what if he really was guilty? What would such a trial do to the already-victimized Jordie Chandler? Though Jordie certainly wasn’t the primary concern of Michael’s attorneys, they empathized with him and felt a sense of responsibility to him simply because of his youth. They probably didn’t care much about his father, though, not after all that had occurred.
When Larry Feldman began nosing into Michael’s finances, he had crossed a line. ‘A lot of terrible business had gone down for Michael, but once Feldman started demanding information about his bank accounts, we knew the game was over,’ said one of Michael’s advisers. ‘You can take pictures of Michael’s dick, and he’s not gonna like it. But once you start trying to figure out how much money he has, that’s where he stops playing around.’
Unbeknownst to even Michael’s attorneys, Lisa Marie Presley had also tried to influence his decision to settle. A seasoned survivor of many publicity wars, she had long thought that Michael should end the matter with a cash pay-out. She was finally able to convince him that, as she later put it, ‘some things, like a good night’s sleep, are more important than public opinion.’
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