Randy Phillips Testimony - Day1

 
Michael Jackson - The Mexico deposition - 1993 Part 1/17 from sol kim on Vimeo.

 

 

 

 

Michael made a highly publicized announcement in 1993 that he was ending his "Dangerous" tour early to enter a substance abuse rehab program because of an addiction to painkillers. His last "Dangerous" concert was in Mexico on November 11 1993, and the video above was a deposition recorded November 8.

"I don't remember hearing it," Phillips testified, referring to the tour cancellation.

"When's the first time you heard?" Jackson lawyer Brian Panish asked.

"Just now," Phillips responded.

 

Phillips said he didn't learned about it from a December 2008 news story focusing on Jackson's drug abuse and rehab, even though he sent it in an e-mail to Jackson's manager saying:

"Have you read these stories? This reporter did a lot of research."

 

"I don't remember reading it," Phillips testified.

 

 What's up Phillips, have you the same memory loss problem as Paul Gongaware - see my post here? Are we really meant to believe that the CEO of such a huge concert promoter neither heard of nor researched this before 2013. It's laughable. But I see why he's saying this: if he admits he knew Michael's drug history AND ignored warnings that Michael was too ill to perform, he is going to make AEG liable and he's not going to do anything to let THAT happen now is he?

 

 

Phillips began worrying about Michael backing out of the concert tour just a month after he signed the contract with AEG Live to promote and produce it and more than a week before the announcement. OK, so what specifically was worrying Phillips? If Phillips allegedly had no knowledge of Michael being ill or taking drugs, what prompted this even before the announcement of the concerts took place?

 

 

"I was worried that we would have a mess, his career would be over," Phillips testified. "There were a lot of things I was worried about."

 

 

But instead of pulling the plug then, before millions of dollars were spent, AEG Live chose to force Michael ahead.

 

 

"Once we go on sale, which we have the right to do, he is locked," Gongaware wrote to Phillips.

 

 

Michael, his children and manager Tohme Tohme boarded a private jet for the London announcement, but he was not ready when Phillips went to his hotel suite to escort him to the O2 Arena.

 

 

"MJ is locked in his room drunk and despondent. Tohme and I are trying to sober him up and get him to the press conference with his hair/makeup artist," Phillips told parent-company AEG CEO Tim Leiweke in an e-mail.

 

 

Phillips testified it was "a very tense situation" and "frankly, I created the tension in that room. Because I was so nerve-racked, OK, the time slipping away, and his career slipping away."

 

 

AEG was hosting thousands of Michael Jackson fans and hundreds of journalists for the anticipated announcement, which would be seen live around the world.

 

 

 

 

"I screamed at him so loud the walls were shaking," Phillips wrote to Leiweke. "Tohme and I have dressed him, and they are finishing his hair, and then we are rushing to the O2. This is the scariest thing I have ever seen. He's an emotionally paralyzed mess, filled with self-loathing and doubt now that it is show time. He is scared to death. Right now I just want to get through this press conference."

 

 

Phillips e-mailed a man who was waited outside the hotel with a convoy of vehicles that he put Jackson in a cold shower and "just slapped him and screamed at him."

 

 

In court, Phillips downplayed his words as "an exaggeration."
Yes, of course he did, because if Phillips admits he was REALLY worried and concerned, the are going to ask him WHY.

 

 

"I slapped him on the butt," he testified, comparing it to what a football coach would do to a player.

 

 

Michael arrived at the 02 more than two hours late to announce: "This is it. This is really it. This is the final curtain call. OK, I'll see you in July."

 

  

"Now I have to get him on the stage. Scary!" Phillips wrote in an e-mail to another promoter.

 

 

Jackson lawyers contend this fear led AEG Live executives to take control of Michael's life as he prepared in Los Angeles to premiere the tour in London in July of 2009.

 

 

Show producers sent warnings in mid-June that Jackson's health appeared to be failing.

 

 

Associate producer Alif Sankey testified earlier in the trial that she "had a very strong feeling that Michael was dying" because of his frail health.

 

 

She called show director Kenny Ortega after one rehearsal. "I kept saying that 'Michael is dying, he's dying, he's leaving us, he needs to be put in a hospital,'" Sankey said. "'Please do something. Please, please.' I kept saying that. I asked him why no one had seen what I had seen. He said he didn't know."

 

 

After Michael failed to show up at several rehearsals in June -- or was unable to perform sometimes when he did appear -- Gongaware sent an e-mail to Phillips that Jackson lawyers call their "smoking gun."

 

 

They argue the message shows the executives used Murray's fear of losing his lucrative job as Michael's personal physician to pressure him to have Michael ready for rehearsals despite his fragile health. "We want to remind (Murray) that it is AEG, not MJ, who is paying his salary. We want to remind him what is expected of him," Gongaware wrote.

 

 

Gongaware testified earlier that he did not remember writing the e-mail and Phillips testified last week that he didn't remember reading it. How very convenient. A double-act and they are closing ranks.

 

 

However, Phillips convened what he called "an intervention" at Michael's home with Murray, Michael and Ortega present.

 

 

A Los Angeles police detective summarized what Phillips told investigators about that meeting: "Randy (Phillips) stated that Kenny (Ortega) got in Michael's face, at which time Dr. Murray admonished Randy, stating, 'You're not a doctor. Butt out."

 

 

Asked about it in court, Phillips said the detective's summary is wrong. "That's not what I said," Phillips testified. "I told them something completely different than this. They just conflated the people and the things." Oh. So you can remember what you said on this occasion, Phillips, are you suffering from selective memory by any chance?

 

 

What actually happened was Murray "got into and admonished Kenny Ortega not to be an amateur physician and analyse Michael," Phillips said.

 

 

Phillips sent an e-mail after the meeting saying he had confidence in Murray, "who I am gaining immense respect for as I get to deal with him more."

 

 

"This doctor is extremely successful (we check everyone out) and does not need this gig, so he (is) totally unbiased and ethical," Phillips' e-mail said. So, you check everyone out, except you didn't check Murray out nor did you check Michael out?

 

 

He conceded in court that no background check of Murray was conducted by AEG Live. Jackson lawyers argue that had it been done, they would have discovered Murray was in deep debt and dependent on the lucrative job.

 

 

Murray said he was infusing Propofol into Michael every night to treat his insomnia so Michael would be rested for rehearsals.

 

 

Phillips contradicted Gongaware's earlier testimony that Michael was under no contractual obligation to attend rehearsals. Phillips refused to advance money to help Michael pay his staff days before his death because he believed the singer was "in an anticipatory breach" of his contract because he had missed rehearsals, he testified.

 

 

 

 

Phillips acknowledged that he and his lawyer met with Michael's former manager Tohme Tohme -- another key witness in the trial -- last month. The meeting happened in the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel on May 4, at the end of the first week of testimony. That is May 4 2013, folks.

 

 

"I don't remember if it was the testimony in this case or what the lunch was about, but Marvin Putnam (AEG's lead lawyer in the trial) was at the lunch with me," Phillips said when asked about it by Panish. If your memory really is that bad Phillips, they need to replace you as CEO. I suspect he remembers very well what was discussed.

 

 

He couldn't remember "100%" but they may have discussed Tohme's legal battle to get paid by Jackson's estate, he said.

 

 

"I don't remember what I ate that day," Phillips said.

 

 

"I didn't ask you what you ate," Panish replied. "I asked you what you talked about."

 

 

"I can't jail somebody for not answering a question," Palazuelos said when Panish complained Phillips was being evasive. "There's only so much I can do."

 

 

She warned Phillips that jurors would see it for themselves.

 

 

"You give an answer, and you're not answering the question, the jury is going to get the impression that you're being evasive."

 

 

"I realize that," Phillips said.

Of course he realises that, he's doing it on purpose to evade losing AEG money and his saving own ass.

Paul Gongaware - Day 3 Testimony

Paul Gongaware testified on Friday that he never saw indications that Michael used drugs or travelled with a doctor when he managed that tour in 1996 and 1997.

What Gongaware knew -- or didn't know -- about Michael's drug use is a key issue in this case,

Gongaware, under questioning by his own lawyer Friday, testified that he only became aware that Michael was addicted to painkillers when the singer made a public announcement after his "Dangerous" tour abruptly ended, so he could enter rehab in 1993.

He was a manager for the "Dangerous" tour, but only handled logistics and didn't travel with Michael then, he said.

His job on the second half of the "HIStory" tour, however, carried more responsibilities and he worked closely with Michael, he said.

Gongaware testified that he saw "no indication at all" that Michael was using drugs during that tour. "I would be certain to notice it if that was the case."

Did Michael have a doctor treating him during the "HIStory" tour, his lawyer asked.

"Not that I know of," he answered.

In fact, Michael was "sensational" on stage, performing 10 to 12 shows a month, he said. Unlike in the "Dangerous" tour, he never cancelled a show because of his health.

"He only missed one," he said. "That was when Princess Diana died. He heard about the accident, went to bed, woke up, found she passed away and it affected him deeply."

But an interview that Michael gave to Barbara Walters weeks after Diana's death could help Jackson lawyers refute Gongaware's claim that no doctor traveled with the singer during the tour.

Walters asked Michael about how he learned the news that his friend, the Princess, had died.

"I woke up and my doctor gave me the news, and I fell back down in grief and I started to cry," Jackson said. "That's why the inner pain, the pain in my stomach and in my chest, so I said 'I cannot handle this. It's too much.'"

Michael's statement that a doctor was at his bedside when he woke up the day of a scheduled "HIStory" show in Belgium is not the only evidence he did have a physician on the tour.

Dr. Neil Ratner, an anesthesiologist from New York, has acknowledged that he traveled with Michael during part of the tour. He was at Munich, Germany, in July 1997 when a stage collapsed and Michael suffered a back injury. It was two months before Diana's death.

Dr. Ratner declined to talk about his treatment of Michael when CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta confronted him outside his Woodstock, New York, home in July 2009, although he did confirm that Michael had trouble sleeping.

"It's really something I don't want to talk about right now," he told Dr. Gupta.

A source who was close to Michael Jackson told Gupta in 2009 that when Michael had trouble sleeping that Dr. Ratner helped "take him down" and "bring him back up."

Ratner, who was convicted of insurance fraud and stripped of his license to practice medicine for three years in 2002, is on the witness list for the trial and has been questioned in a deposition by each side.

Debbie Rowe will testify that she assisted in administering Propofol to Michael in the 1990s when she was a nurse, AEG Live's Putnam said on the opening day of the trial.


"She saw several doctors put Mr. Jackson to sleep in hotel rooms while on tour," Putnam said, including in Munich, London, Paris.

But Gongaware and others did not know, he said.

"The truth is Mr. Jackson fooled everyone," Putnam said about Michael's Propofol use. "He kept those who might have helped him at a distance and no one knew his deepest, darkest secret."

Michael's ability to keep his private side private meant AEG executives could not see any red flags warning of Michael's destruction, Putnam said.

"They didn't see this coming," he said. "They had no idea."

Putnam said Jackson family members, including Janet and her famous siblings, will testify about their failed attempts at intervention and their lack of knowledge about what was happening.

"If they didn't know what was going on, how could someone else think there was even a problem," he said.


But Jackson lawyers will argue that Gongaware, who closely watched expenses on the "HIStory" tour because it was losing money at one point, would have noticed spending on hotel rooms and fees for a doctor traveling with the tour.

Trouble is Putnam, someone else DID think that there was a problem In fact SIX people by my count - see my post here. They knew, they brought it to AEG's attention, they even suggested a psychiatrist for Michael, but AEG decided that it was all an over exaggeration and ignored the advice. Now AEG are using the excuse of poor memory, and denial to defend themselves. This, my friends, is how corporations defend their actions these days, and I am not just talking about big cases like this one.
The family also knew something was wrong. They may not have known what exactly, but they would have had a pretty good idea it wasn't good for Michael.

FOOTNOTE:
As I write this, Michael's beautiful daughter Paris is recovering in hospital after an attempted suicide.
We don't know today what triggered this episode, all we know is that she was unhappy for a while and has a lot going on in her life. She is Michael's daughter, so I am really worried about her.
I don't know if this trial played any part in her unhappiness, but I can say that even for myself, someone who never met Michael, the information coming out is particularly difficult to cope with.
I have had to give myself some time off from blogging about it, because it has been very painful to follow. And very depressing.
I can't imagine what it must be like for his children.

Paul Gongaware Day 2 Testimony

"You aren't going to kill the artist, are you?" Michael Jackson purportedly asked producers after viewing and "endorsing" a test of the combustible special effects, a production manager recalled in a June 19, 2009, email revealed in court.

Concert production manager John "Bugsy" Houghdahl relayed the quote to his boss Randy Phillips, the CEO of concert giant AEG Live, as part of an explanation of the singer's sick and disoriented demeanor at the June 19 rehearsal in Los Angeles.



Houghdahl said he assumed the comment was a passing reference to the pyrotechnics, but he also said show director Kenny Ortega later observed Michael acting like "a basket case."


"Kenny said (Jackson) was shaking and couldn't hold his knife and fork. Kenny had to cut his food for him before he could eat, and then had to use his fingers," Houghdahl wrote in the email. "I don't know how much embellishment there is to this, but (Kenny) said repeatedly that MJ was in no shape to go on stage." (Houghdahl is referring to June 19, not the whole rehearsal period).


Katherine's lawyer Brian Panish said outside court that he thought the Houghdahl email showed Michael was shaken by the pyrotechnic display after having suffered serious burns from an explosion on the set of a 1984 Pepsi commercial.

A lawyer for AEG said that wasn't the case.

"It may seem chilling in retrospect, but (Houghdahl) believed (Michael) was making a joke at the time. Michael Jackson wasn't afraid of the pyrotechnics. He wanted them," AEG lawyer Marvin Putnam told the News.

Panish needled Gongaware repeatedly on Wednesday, asking what steps AEG took to address Ortega's concerns, and why some messages about Michael's meltdown were sent by Phillips to his personal email address, not his business account.


Gongaware said he didn't know why Phillips used different email addresses for him but that he believed everyone wanted what was best for Michael.

"The artist's health is the most important thing, I agree with that," Gongaware testified Wednesday. "The artist is the most important thing."

Gongaware also told the court he wasn't worried about Jackson getting adequate health care.


An email from "This Is It" concert documentary director Kenny Ortega about Michael being late or absent for rehearsals. Gongaware responds with a request for a face-to-face meeting with Michael's doctor, Conrad Murray.

"We want to remind him that it is AEG, not MJ, who is paying his salary. We want him to understand what is expected of him," Gongaware says in the email.

The statement is evidence that AEG hired Murray, according to the plaintiffs. It is the centrepiece of their lawsuit.

For 30 minutes Gongaware rebuffed questions about that email. Repeatedly, he testified, "I don't know"; "I don't remember writing it." His only concession was, "I was going through hundreds of emails. If I knew lawyers would be picking apart everything, I would have been more careful."

Further emails show that as the opening of "This Is It" drew near, Ortega writes that Michael needs nourishment, physical therapy. "We have 20 days, we can't let him slip."

Gongaware responds: "We're on it."

Ortega says, "Super, not a minute too soon."

Days later another email was headlined "Trouble on the front." It warned Gongaware that "We might be getting beyond damage control here."

Yet on the stand Gongaware testified that no physical therapist or nutritionist was ever hired. He said he thought Ortega was exaggerating Michael's health concerns.

He said Michael didn't like to rehearse, that previously Michael didn't rehearse before the "HIStory" tour either. But when the lights went up, Michael was "on," he stated.

AEG's position is that Michel did not die from poor health or pressure -- rather that it was Dr. Murray's decision to secretly administer an intravenous sedative. AEG says in court documents that Murray's conduct was not foreseeable.

 

Paul Gongaware also testified his only role in Murray's contract was negotiating the price of  Murray's services in compliance with what Michael asked him to do.

Gongaware said that neither he nor anyone at the entertainment giant investigated Murray's background or credentials.

"The fact that he had been Michael Jackson's personal physician for three years was good enough for me," Gongaware said.

Who told him that? I was aware that Murray had helped Michael's children in Las Vegas a few years before, but does that make him Michael's personal physician?

Asked if he knew that Murray was in financial difficulties when he took the job as tour doctor, Gongaware answered no.

He said that Murray initially asked for $5 million to travel to London with Michael and tend to him during the tour.

"I just told him it wasn't going to happen," he said, recalling that Michael then suggested offering him $150,000 a month.

"Michael Jackson insisted on it and recommended him and it was not for me to tell him no," said Gongaware, who is a defendant in the multibillion-dollar lawsuit.

"I wanted to provide what was necessary for him to do his job...He wanted a doctor and I wanted him to be healthy."

Even after the offer of $150,000, Murray wasn't satisfied.

"He started saying he wanted more and I said, 'The offer is coming directly from the artist," Gongaware said.

Minutes later, he said Murray accepted.

"Did that seem desperate to you?" asked Panish.

"No," said Gongaware. "He just accepted Michael's offer."

Gongaware often pleaded poor memory of events. He said he may have met with Michael as many as 10 times, but could remember only two of the meetings and only one when Murray was present.

Really, is this how people wriggle out of their responsibilities these days, by claiming poor memory?

Prodded by Panish, he remembered a meeting at which Michael arrived late from a doctor's appointment and had slurred speech.

"He was a bit off," he said, "that was the only time I saw him like that."

At the heart of the case is who hired Murray. At first, Gongaware insisted he did no negotiating with Murray, but, confronted with emails and his previous testimony, he changed his position and said, "The only thing I did with Dr. Murray was negotiate a price."

He indicated that he was so shocked by Murray's demand that he consulted a doctor friend to see what he would charge for the same job. The other doctor said he would have gone on tour for $10,000 a week.

"Did you ever convey that to Michael Jackson?" asked Panish.

"I don't recall," said Gongaware whose testimony was peppered with that phrase.

Murray's fees technically AEGs responsibility?

Shawn Trell and Kathy Jorrie Photo: AP /Nick Ut

The 'This Is It' tour budget revealed that Murray's fee was listed as "production costs," which made it AEG's responsibility, instead of including it in "advances", which could have supported their claim that it was meant as a loan to Michael. While calling AEG's Chief Financial Officer "a very detailed-oriented guy," Trell admitted the budgeting was an error made by the CFO.

I'm not sure that I understand this. From my understanding, Michael was to pay ALL Productions costs out of his 90% share of the profits, which therefore was not AEG's responsibility.

In an effort to prove that Murray worked for AEG, emails sent a month before Michael's death were shown by the Jacksons' attorneys. Murray's contract terms were laid out in the letters, but Trell denied the emails demonstrated an employment relationship, despite his confirmation that director Kenny Ortega was also paid based on an agreement laid out solely in emails, instead of a formal contract.

During the testimony, Trell also reiterated that AEG heard of concerns from people involved in the concert production about Michael's poor condition and "they took it seriously," dismissing claims that they ignored a series of red flags that should have warned them of the singer's frail mental state.

An email from director Kenny Ortega with "trouble at the front" in the subject line was shown.

"I honestly don't think he is ready for this based on the continued physical weakening and deepening emotional state," the director voiced his concerns. "There are strong signs of paranoia, anxiety and obsessive-like behavior."

"I think the very best thing we can do is get a top Psychiatrist in to evaluate him ASAP. It's like there are two people there. One (deep inside) trying to hold on to what he was and still can be and not wanting us to quit him, the other in his weakened and troubled state ... I honestly felt if I had encouraged or allowed him on stage last night he could have hurt himself. I believe we need professional guidance in this matter."

Trell said a meeting was held to discuss the matter. At the meeting, MJ allegedly said he would improve and Murray agreed to help. According to witnesses, he did great during the next two days of rehearsals.

"Michael and the doctor stressed that he was OK. They had it under control," said Marvin Putnam, AEG's attorney.

The problem I have with this is:

a) The doc was under huge financial pressure, which could lead him to do what he is told, rather than what is right for the patient. AEG now say they did not do a check on the doctor, so they wouldn't have known this at the time. However, Paul Gongaware had past experience of celebrities and 'Dr Feelgoods', so the concept would not have been totally alien to them.
b) More worryingly, a top psychiatrist was not at the meeting and therefore how could AEG know for sure that Michael really is OK? Dr Murray was a cardiologist, not a psychiatrist, so he is not best placed to judge Michael's mental state either.

Paul Gongaware - Day 1 Testimony

Michael in Bangkok August 24 1993

AEG Live co-CEO Paul Gongaware, whose career as a concert promoter started with Elvis Presley's last tour, testified on Tuesday about Michael Jackson's final days.

"I was working on the Elvis tour when he died so I kind of knew what to expect," Gongaware wrote in an e-mail to a friend two weeks after Michael died. "Still quite a shock."

Gongaware, who was one of the top producers of Michael's comeback concerts, is expected to be on the witness stand for several days in the fifth week of the Michael Jackson wrongful death trial.


AEG lawyers contend that Michael Jackson chose, hired and supervised Murray, and that his bad decisions were fuelled by a drug addiction their executives had no way of knowing about.

Brian Panish questioned Gongaware about his knowledge of drug use during concert tours. He should have been able to recognize red flags signalling Michael's drug use because of his experience with Presley, and his time as Michael's tour manager in the 1990s, the Jacksons contend.

This is something I also thought, because this man had worked with Michael on the 'Dangerous' tour, which had to be cancelled because Michael went into rehab. I didn't know until this week that Gongaware also worked for Presley on HIS last tour, before Presley overdosed.

"I kind of knew what was going to happen, yes," Gongaware testified. Panish then showed jurors the e-mail in which he made a similar statement.


When Gongaware was managing Michael's 1993 'Dangerous Tour', he warned the tour doctor "Don't be a Dr. Nick" -- a reference to Presley's last physician -- the doctor testified in a deposition.

"Dr. Nick was the doctor whose over prescription of drugs to Elvis had led to Elvis' death," according to a court filing by lawyers for the Jackson family.

Presley collapsed in the bathroom of his Memphis, Tennessee, mansion -- Graceland -- on August 16, 1977, at age 42. While his death was ruled the result of an irregular heartbeat, the autopsy report was sealed amid accusations that the abuse of prescription drugs caused the problem.

"Dr. Nick" -- Dr. George Nichopoulos -- said later he was treating Presley for insomnia. He was charged with overprescribing drugs to Presley, but he was acquitted. He later lost his medical license in another case.


Gongaware was with Presley's manager Col. Tom Parker when he first met Michael in Las Vegas, he testified.

The Jackson lawyers are using Gongaware's Elvis and "Dr. Nick" reference to argue that "AEG knew Jackson had suffered chronic substance abuse and drug dependency problems for many years."

"Shortly after he joined the 'Dangerous' tour in 1993, Dr. Finkelstein was asked to treat Jackson for pain," the Jackson filing said, referring to Dr. Stuart Finkelstein, a doctor on the 1993 tour.

"Having observed signs of opiate addiction in Jackson, Dr. Finkelstein nonetheless administered Demerol by injection, and administered morphine intravenously in Jackson's Bangkok hotel room for 24 hours."

After that, Finkelstein told Gongaware "he thought Jackson had an opiate dependency problem," the filing said.

"For three and a half months, the 'Dangerous' tour continued," it said. "Another doctor attended Jackson regularly, on one occasion breaking into Dr. Finkelstein's bag to get opiates to administer to Jackson. Gongaware was there the whole time, in charge of tour logistics, aware of the various physicians present, and he discussed with Dr. Finkelstein Jackson's opiate problem."

Seriously? A doctor broke into another doctor's bag in order to get opiates? Obviously there is nothing some of these doctors won't do.

When Gongaware warned Dr. Finkelstein, whom the brief described as his "close friend," not to become Jackson's "Dr. Nick," he was "warning me, you know, don't get all infatuated where you start administering meds to a rock star and have the rock star overdose and die on you," Dr. Finkelstein testified.

Despite working as a tour promoter for 37 years -- including for Led Zeppelin, the Grateful Dead and many others -- Gongaware testified that the only artist he ever knew that was using drug on tour was Rick James.

Gongaware is currently the tour manager for the Rolling Stones North American tour.



Jurors were shown several e-mails from Gongaware that Jackson lawyers suggested were evidence that AEG Live deliberately misled Michael about how much money he would make from his comeback concerts and how many days he would have to rest between shows.

Gongaware wrote to his boss, AEG Live President Randy Phillips, that they should present gross ticket sales numbers to Michael, not the percentage of the net profits, during contract talks. "Maybe gross is a better number to throw around if we use numbers with Mikey listening," his e-mail said.

He sent an e-mail to his assistant in March 2009 suggesting that she design a concert calendar for Michael using light tan colors for show dates, while drawing attention to his rest days.

"I don't want the shows to stand out so much when MJ looks at it. Less contrast between work and off. Maybe off days in a contrasting soft color. Put 'OFF' in each off day after July 8, as well. Figure it out so it looks like he's not working so much."

Under questioning Tuesday, Gongaware said he "wasn't trying to fool him. I wanted to present it in the best possible light."

Hmm. Yeah OK. You're not convincing me Gongaware!


Gongaware is also a key witness because he wrote what Jackson's lawyers call the "smoking gun" e-mail which they argue shows AEG Live executives used Murray's fear of losing his lucrative job as Michael's personal physician to pressure him to have Michael ready for rehearsals despite his fragile health.

Gongaware's e-mail to show director Kenny Ortega, sent 11 days before Michael's death, addressed concerns that Murray had kept Michael from a rehearsal the day before:

"We want to remind (Murray) that it is AEG, not MJ, who is paying his salary. We want to remind him what is expected of him." Gongaware, in a video deposition played in court on the first day of the trial, said he could not remember writing the e-mail. How convenient. 

"They put Dr. Murray in a position where if he said Michael can't go or can't play, if he said I can't give you those drugs, then he doesn't get paid," Jackson lawyer Brian Panish told jurors in his opening statements.

AEG lawyer Marvin Putnam said in his opening statement that Gongaware and other AEG executives had no way of knowing about Michael's use of propofol to sleep.

"AEG knew nothing about this decade-long propofol use," Putnam said. "They were a concert promoter. How could they know?"

Decade-long? Is there any proof that Michael had used propofol for decade? We know he used it in 1993 and 2009, but that does not prove he used it over a whole decade.

Gongaware will also face questions about an e-mail in which he seemed to question Michael's commitment to his "This Is It" tour.

"We cannot be forced into stopping this, which MJ will try to do because he is lazy and constantly changes his mind to fit his immediate wants," he wrote to AEG's Phillips.

Michael's makeup artist Karen Faye testified earlier abut an incident in which Gongaware became frustrated because Michael locked himself in a bathroom at his home, refusing to leave for rehearsals at the Forum. Gongaware was "angry and kind of desperate to get Michael to the Forum," Faye said.

She overheard Gongaware screaming on the phone at Michael's security guard, telling him "to get him out of the bathroom. Do you have a key? Do whatever it takes."

Jackson lawyers are also expected to ask Gongaware about e-mails he received that raised questions about Michael's health in the last weeks of his life.

"This Is It" production director John "Bugzee" Houghdahl wrote to him on June 19, 2009 -- six days before Michael died -- "I have watched him deteriorate in front of my eyes over the last 8 weeks. He was able to do multiple 360 spins back in April. He'd fall on his ass if he tried now."

Houghdahl's e-mail, titled "trouble at the Front" was written after Ortega sent Michael home from a rehearsal because of his strange behaviour.

"He was a basket case and Kenny was concerned he would embarrass himself on stage, or worse yet -- get hurt," Houghdahl wrote. "The company is rehearsing right now, but the DOUBT is pervasive."

I suppose Gongaware 'forgot' about this email as well? Is this how everyone avoids the truth these days?

UPDATED:

In an email that was sent on March 25, 2009,  Randy Phillips said 

"We need to pull the plug now. I will explain."

Gongaware denied that the email was a reference to calling off Michael's "This Is It" concerts in London but instead was pointed at "pulling the plug on Karen Faye," the singer's hairstylist, makeup artist and longtime friend who had expressed fears about Michael's poor health.

So by 25th March, 20 days after Michael had announced 'This Is It" concerts in London, Karen Faye was already expressing concerns about Michael's health. "We never talked about pulling the plug on the Michael Jackson tour, not that I recall.” said Gongaware, co-chief executive of AEG Live's touring division.

Faye testified earlier in the trial that she told tour director Kenny Ortega in June that she was worried Michael would die.

In another March 25, 2009, email, Ortega wrote Gongaware that it was Faye's "strong opinion that this is dangerous and impractical with consideration to MJ's health and ability to perform." 

So they were aware 3 months beforehand, that Michael may not be fit for the tour. Yet still they were using strong-arm tactics against Michael, to get his to rehearsal.

Trolling and the MJ Community

For the record:
I am not a Troll, I do not go around Trolling forums, chat rooms or blogs. I do not know, communicate or collude with anyone in Trolling any forum, chat room or blog.

I DO state my opinion.

Stating an opinion is NOT Trolling, and for those of you who can't tell the difference:



"In Internet slang, a troll (/ˈtroʊl/, /ˈtrɒl/) is someone who posts inflammatory,[1] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as a forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[2] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion". Source Wikipedia


"In general, an opinion is a belief about matters commonly considered to be subjective, i.e. it is based on that which is less than absolutely certain, and is the result of emotion or interpretation of facts. An opinion may be supported by an argument, although people may draw opposing opinions from the same set of facts. Opinions rarely change without new arguments being presented. It can be reasoned that one opinion is better supported by the facts than another by analyzing the supporting arguments.[1] In casual use, the term opinionmay be the result of a person's perspective, understanding, particular feelings, beliefs, anddesires. It may refer to unsubstantiated information, in contrast to knowledge and fact-based beliefs." Source Wikipedia.


After 25th June 2009, many forums, chat rooms and blogs were set-up to discuss Michael Jackson. I joined several of them, as they initially seemed to have new information to share on what had happened to Michael. However, as some of these grew in popularity, the owners started to run them like a Dictatorship, and anyone who expressed a differing opinion to theirs was banned and/or called a Troll. I saw it happen to many people. Worse than that, some of the owners started to reveal their own agendas, which usually involved using Michael to springboard into some agenda dear to their heart.

I know that there WERE Trolls out there, and they really did attack these forums, chat rooms and blogs, because I witnessed some of it. I don't know if they were working collectively, because I never had any dealings with them. Sometimes, the Trolling got so bad that 99% of the content of some forums, chat rooms and blogs started to be Trolling or discussing Trolling.

That is why I started my own blog, because information was getting buried underneath the lies, and enough was enough.


I am not going to name names because I am deliberately not trying to be inflammatory or provoke anyone. Those of you who have been in and around the MJ Community will probably know exactly who I am referring to, and those of you who don't, you now know that it happens and can keep an eye out for it!

A sixth person warned of Michael's deteriorating health.

Michael tours Harrods 1999

Last week, Michael Jackson's ' This Is It' stage manager, John Hougdahl, testified that he was concerned and warned AEG Live that Michael's health was deteriorating before his death in 2009.

According to new evidence, John Hougdahl warned promoters that the Michael's health was rapidly deteriorating, and he advised them to hire a psychiatrist and a personal trainer to help him, according to website RadarOnline.com.

In the email, which was sent to AEG executive Randy Philips, on June 19, 2009, John wrote:

"I have watched him deteriorate in front of my eyes over the last eight weeks.

"My laymen's degree tells me he needs a shrink to get mentally prepared to get on stage and then a trainer to get him in physical shape. He used to do multiple 360 spins back in April. He'd fall on his ass if he tried now."

So that's six people now:

16th June 2009, the show's musical director Michael Bearden warned Kenny Ortega in an email that Michael could not sing and dance at the same time.
19th June 2009 associate producer Alif Sankey warned Kenny Ortega in a 'phone call that Michael might die.
19th June 2009 John Hougdahl emailed Randy Phillips about Michael's declining health.
20th June 2009 Michael's make-up artist Karen Faye contacted his manager Frank Dileo in an email, expressing concerns following Michael's relapse the previous day. She also expressed her concerns to Randy Phillips.
Travis Payne, the choreographer, also expressed his concerns to Kenny Ortega.
Terry Harvey, concert promoter, spoke to Tohme Tohme and Frank Dileo about Michael's frail state.

Yet. Yet. In this article from 27 June 2009, everyone, including Ortega, paints a very different picture:



"Ortega said he had no knowledge of the singer's taking any drugs or medication. He also denied that Jackson had overextended himself by working out four hours a day, six days a week in preparation for the tour.

"He was dancing, training, working every day with our choreographer Travis [Payne]," Ortega said. "Michael has always been slight. That was his fighting weight. He was getting rest time, coming in and working with the band, guiding the singers, working on orchestrations. He was enthusiastically involved in every creative aspect of this production."

Randy Phillips, chief executive of AEG Live, the concert promoter that will forfeit the more than $20 million it put into staging Jackson's comeback, was also at Staples on Wednesday. He recalled Jackson being in ebullient spirits.

"It was fantastic, he was so great. I got goose bumps," Phillips said. "It made me realize why I got into this business.

"I take great solace in the pride and confidence he exhibited during production rehearsals on Wednesday night. That is the memory I will cherish for the rest of my life," Phillips said.

Ken Ehrlich, the longtime executive producer of the Grammy Awards who staged televised performances by Jackson half a dozen times, met with the performer at Staples on Wednesday to discuss a television project. "He was very warm and funny. He was having a good time," Ehrlich said.

After the meeting, the singer invited Ehrlich to stay and watch him rehearse.

The show was still a work in progress, with props that Ehrlich recalled as "looking pretty magical" strewn about the venue's floor.

"What I saw that night was a person who was still in the process of learning the show," Ehrlich said. "I watched Kenny Ortega walk him through some stage directions. I know [Michael's] method, and there's a certain reticence when he's not in full make-up and wardrobe to 'give it.' He would have been ready by the time he got to London."

Ehrlich said Jackson showed his pervasive influence: "The hair on the back of my neck stood up. I wasn't watching Justin Timberlake or Chris Brown or Usher or any of the hundreds of acts that have taken from Michael. The modern inheritors of his art. It was him."

Jackson hired Ed Alonzo -- a concert magician-comedian known as "the Misfit of Magic," who also worked on Britney Spears' "Circus" tour -- to create two set-piece illusions for his London shows. One illusion set to the opening number involved an illuminated sphere that would have floated around the singer's body, flown out above the audience and then landed back in Jackson's hand before immolating in a blaze of light.

Alonzo recalled that the singer arrived at Staples around 6:30 p.m. Wednesday but did not begin rehearsing until 9, complaining -- perhaps facetiously, the magician said -- of laryngitis.

"He looked great and had great energy. He wasn't singing at full level, but it was as beautiful as ever," Alonzo said. "He went from one number to the other. 'Let's do that again.' He wanted to look at props for the 'Thriller' number, a gigantic spider. He was dancing, singing, joking with the crew. If he was having any aches or pains, nobody knew about it that night."

Frank DiLeo, Jackson's manager, said the singer seemed upbeat and ready for the challenges of mounting a comeback that he had hoped would restore his superstardom -- reinstating his cultural relevance, erasing part of his massive debt and finally allowing his three children to understand why fans worldwide herald him as the King of Pop.

"He just told me how happy he was and that things were working out the way he wanted," DiLeo said."

In his testimony for Dr Murray's trial in 2011, Ortega says he knew something was wrong with Michael after the 19th June episode. He wrote an email at 2:04 the next morning (after the rehearsal ended) to Randy Phillips about it.

During questioning in 2011, Ortega was asked:

On any occasion, during rehearsals for 'This Is It' did it ever strike you that Michael Jackson might have been on drugs?

Ortega replied "Yes."

I accept that none of the people around Michael at this time could have known that Michael was having Propofol administered to him 5 nights a week. Only the children, Dr Murray and the cleaner were allowed upstairs in Michael's rented home, and Michael asked Murray to clear away all the IV paraphernalia in the morning, before the children woke up. So I accept that people would not know exactly what was affecting Michael. But the truth is they all concealed the fact that they knew he was unwell, until Murray's trial in 2011 - that's two years of these people lying. Having been lied to for two years and then hearing Ortega's testimony was like being stabbed in the heart.
So they did know Michael Jackson was unwell, and they suspected drugs of some kind were involved. 

The ugly truth about AEG and Michael Jackson

Michael in 2002

 

The last two days have covered testimony from AEG Live Senior Vice President and General Counsel Shawn Trell, and it's pretty clear that AEG lie and have no respect for Michael Jackson.



Firstly, Shawn Trell testified yesterday that AEG Live LLC did not conduct any background checks or supervise the doctor who was later convicted of killing Michael Jackson.
This goes against the email sent by Randy Phillips, AEG Live President, to Kenny Ortega saying :

“This doctor is extremely successful (we check everyone out) and does not need this gig, so he is totally unbiased and ethical.”

So what is going on here? Either Phillips was flat out lying, knowing full well that nobody had performed any such checks, or he had asked for the checks to be made, but in fact they were not carried out by AEG staff, and the staff lied to Phillips. Either way, it paints AEG senior managers as liars.
It could also suggest that they are trying to convince Ortgea, and maybe others, that all was well with Michael, and allay any fears they might have down the line. It seems in line with my opinion that they just wanted Michael to get on stage, regardless of the consequencies.



Secondly, AEG referred to Michael in derogatory terms in emails, which shows outright lack of respect, especially from senior managers.


Jackson lawyer Brian Panish showed jurors an e-mail Trell sent on January 28, 2009, to Ted Fikre, AEG's chief legal officer, letting him know he was about to go to Michael's home for the signing of the contract for his "This Is It" concert tour.


"Does that mean you get to meet the freak?" Fikre replied.


Trell responded: "Apparently. Not sure how I feel about that. Interesting for sure, but kind of creepy."


The revelation brought an audible gasp in the Los Angeles courtroom at the wrongful death trial Wednesday and left fans crying.



"Is it the policy of AEG to talk in derogatory terms about the artist you're going to do business with?" Jackson lawyer Brian Panish asked.

"No," Trell answered.

But it was OK to talk about Michael Jackson this way then AEG?



Travis Payne's testimony

Michael and Travis during filming for 'This Is It' June 2009



Under cross examination, choreographer Travis Payne acknowledged that some of Michael's behaviour, including grogginess, lethargy, insomnia and occasional paranoia, were possible symptoms of prescription drug abuse. He also said that despite testifying earlier that he worked with Michael one-on-one five days a week, he couldn't recall how many rehearsals the singer actually attended. Payne had also expressed his concerns to 'This Is It' director Kenny Ortega.

Some of the behaviour occurred after Michael's visits with dermatologist Dr. Arnold Klein, who Payne believed was performing cosmetic treatments on the singer so he would be comfortable performing onstage again.

"Sometimes in rehearsal, Michael would appear just a little loopy," Payne said, adding that the singer appeared to be "assisted or under the influence of something."

Michael was struggling to get into shape for the shows, and Payne said his voice coach suggested using a voice track for fast-paced songs until the singer's stamina improved.

He said Michael wanted to use a teleprompter during the shows as "extra security," but it was an aid the performer had not used in his two previous tours.

"You could sense that something was wrong, you just didn't know what it was?" plaintiff's attorney Brian Panish asked. Yes, Payne replied.

The choreographer had remained composed throughout most of his testimony, occasionally smiling and politely trying to answer questions. But after several hours of testy exchanges with Panish, his voice quivered and he dabbed his eyes with a tissue.

"I don't have a dog in this race," Payne said at one point. "I'm just trying to have a conversation with you and tell the truth."
 

So, here is another long-term colleague who raised concerns - that takes the count to five. Five people who independently raised concerns either to Kenny Ortegea, or Randy Phillips. Some said they thought Michael was taking something, others actually spelled it out and said Michael might die.
Yet AEG are still trying to convince us that they didn't know anything was wrong.

Michael unable to sing and dance at the same time in rehearsals

Michael in Cape Town 1997

On June 16, 2009 music arranger Michael Bearden revealed that Michael was unable to sing live and dance, just three weeks away from the start at London’s 02 Arena. This was also two days before Michael was shivering and cold at rehearsals.

In a message entitled Plan B, Bearden told Kenny Ortega, producer and director of the 'This Is It' tour, that he planned using Michael's studio material.

Bearden wrote: “If we can’t get everything we need from the vault I can use what we have and take out ad libs and such to try to make it feel new.

“MJ is not in shape enough yet to sing this stuff live and dance at the same time. He can use the ballads to sing live and get his stamina back ... I have full confidence he can sing the majority of the show live.

“His voice sounds amazing right now he just needs to build it back up.”

Choreographer Travis Payne, who let slip that Michael needed golf carts to get around the arena, responded with, “Great idea”.


Promoter Terry Harvey claims that Michael had laid down vocals over several months to work as back-up material for shows.

He insists he made Michael's managers Dr Tohme Tohme, Frank DiLeo and contract lawyer Dennis Hawk aware of his dangerously frail state.

He says he warned Di Leo, “You are going to kill Michael.”

Harvey went on to say “On This Is It there were moments where he wasn’t singing, his energy levels were down and anyone who worked with him in the past could tell Michael was a way off from 100 per cent. We found out Michael was in the studio recording tracks for the show and even new albums in his last months. You can put your voice in a sequencer and backing track for live shows, so if you don’t want to sing you mime and fans don’t realise.”

I said as much in my post yesterday - people who had worked with Michael in the past knew that Michael was not up to par: Karen Faye, Michael Bush, Michael Bearden, Terry Harvey. They all tried to raise the alarm. Michael Bearden's email also reveals how they probably made up the sound track for the 'This Is It' film - they took out the ad libs from pre-recorded material, and used that. They asked Karen Faye to touch up the film footage to make Michael look healthier, but she refused. However that doesn't mean they didn't get someone else to do it. I had suspected that they had carefully selected the best film footage and then re-worked the sound, but they probably touched up the film as well. I know plenty of fans who will argue how great Michael looked and sang in 'This Is It', but they have been fed a lie, and I've suspected it all along. Parts of the film break my heart, despite the cover-up job.

Other documents show how, five days before Michael's death, Ortega asked AEG managing director Randy Phillips to pull the plug.

On June 20 Ortega wrote: “My concern is that now that we’ve brought the doctor in to the fold ... the artist may be unable to rise to the occasion due to real emotional stuff.”.

The next quote is telling, and I think is the root of AEG's attitude to all the concerns raised about Michael's health.

Randy Phillips refused to consider stopping the 'This Is It' concerts. “You cannot imagine the harm and ramifications of stopping the show now,” he said.

“I am not just talking about AEG’s interests here, but the myriad of stuff and lawsuits swirling around MJ that I crisis manage, and also his well-being.” Signing off as Randy he added: “It’s time to put out the fire, not burn the building.”

UPDATED: Karen Faye's moving testimony - Michael Jackson

Michael in Munich 1999

Karen Faye, who had been Michael Jackson's make-up artist for nearly 30 years, testified about Michael's health in the days before 25th June 2009.

She said Michael was cold as an “ice cube” on June 19, 2009, after a costume fitting.

"He couldn't get warm. I had a space heater, (and) I put it next to him and put him on the sofa and wrapped him in blankets and held him very close to me,” Faye said.

Michael Jackson costume fitting with Zaldy 19 June 2009

Michael at a healthy weight



Karen said she watched tour director Kenny Ortega try to feed Michael some chicken and pleaded with him to call a doctor.

The next day, she sent an email to Michael's manager, Frank DiLeo. A fan who had a recent meeting with Michael had contacted her with concerns, and she told DiLeo she agreed with the fan.

Jurors and  Katherine Jackson watched as the fan’s email was projected on a courtroom screen.

“(Michael) took his jacket off, and I saw something horrible. A skeleton. I watched his back. It was only bones. I am still in shock,” the fan said of her June 2009 meeting with the star, during which he tried on a jacket.

“It is humanly impossible for a human being to be a skeleton and dance for two hours straight without any danger,” the fan wrote.

Fans, such as myself, who spent many hours doing online research, trying to find out why Michael had suddenly died, have heard this story before. There was a website set-up by some fans who were around Michael in the last few months, and saw his health deteriorate. They contacted Karen about their concerns. They wrote to Michael as well, and put copies of their letters up on the website called This-Is-Not-It. But many fans disbelieved them, and thought they were glory seeking, and making up stories to gain fame. The letters have now been taken down, but I printed copies of them. 
The fan mentioned by Karen in her testimony above, visited Michael on 11th June 2009 whilst he was filming the Dome Project (see my timeline here). She gave him a red jacket as a gift, and it was while he was trying it on that she saw how thin and emaciated he was. She said that the jacket was a small woman's size but was still too large on him.
I think you'd agree from the photo above at the costume fitting that Michael was much thinner than he normally was. I have argued about this many times on fan forums, and yes Michael has been thin before, for example during the 2005 trial. But my point is, he wasn't about to start a 50 show concert in 2005. The body needs energy for a performance, and draws on the body's reserves. If you have no bodily fat to burn up, the body starts to break down muscle for energy.

19th June was the day that Michael was sent home from rehearsal by Kenny Ortega, who said he was incoherent, shivering and obsessive.

You can read more of Karen's testimony here.



Many fans also do not like Karen, and believe she is a liar. However, this testimony is under oath, and I believe what she is saying is the truth. I personally don't know what Karen nor the fans who spoke out about Michael's health, really have to gain from lying at this point. Lying isn't going to earn them money nor help them gain longlasting fame.

UPDATED 14th May

"Oh, my God, Turkle, I can see Michael's heart beat through the skin in his chest," stylist Michael Bush said after a costume fitting on June 19, 2009.

Turkle is the nickname of makeup artist Karen Faye.

"Get him a bucket of chicken," manager Frank DiLeo said in reply to concerns about Michael's weight loss, Faye testified.

"It was such a cold response, it broke my heart," Faye said through tears.

The Michael Jackson that the public saw in the documentary "This Is It" is not reality, Faye said.

She was asked to help retouch the video to make Michael look healthier on the big screen, she testified. But she refused.

"It was a lie. I didn't want to lie," Faye said. "Everybody was lying after he died, saying that Michael was well, and everybody knew he wasn't. I felt that retouching Michael was just a part of that lie."

Before Faye testified, jurors heard a similarly disturbing description of Michael in his final days from "This Is It" associate producer Alif Sankey.

Michael "was not speaking normally" at the June 19 costume fitting, Sankey said. She and producer Kenny Ortega cried after he left because of his appearance and what he said."God keeps talking to me," Michael told Ortega, Sankey testified.

Faye said Michael seemed "frightened," and he was talking to himself, repeating "the same thing over and over again."

"He kept repeating, 'Why can't I choose?'" she said.

Michael was shivering from chills, and it was "like I was touching ice" when she put on his makeup, Faye testified.

Faye said she raised her concerns with AEG Live CEO Randy Phillips. He told her, "Yeah, this is bad. It's not so good. I had to scrape Michael off the floor in London ... because he was so drunk," she said.

Sankey, who knew Michael since she first danced with him in 1987, said she screamed at Ortega in a phone call after the June 19 rehearsal, begging that he get help for Michael.

"I kept saying that 'Michael is dying, he's dying, he's leaving us, he needs to be put in a hospital,'" Sankey said. "'Please do something. Please, please.' I kept saying that. I asked him why no one had seen what I had seen. He said he didn't know."




So it seems that people who knew Michael and had worked with him before, could see that he he was not well. If you have seen Michael work before, and compare that to his 2009 rehearsals, you will see a difference. See the videos of 'Billie Jean' on my post here. Michael was always very energetic, and moved around a lot. A lot more than most people do, and more than most dancers do. So if you only saw him rehearse in 2009, you might not see a problem.

However, enough people saw real problems on 19th June, and although personally I think even then was not soon enough, someone should have taken responsibility at this point. But what we know actually happened, was a meeting took place at Michael's house with Dr Murray present. Murray and Michael said everything was fine.

Knowing Michael's history, this was hardly an acceptable reassurance.

AEG can't have it both ways

Michael Jackson October 2008

Evidence was given this week about Michael Jackson's physical health, by Dr. Christopher Rogers. The coroner's report at the autopsy showed that Michael was in good health, and that he would be expected to have a normal lifespan.

"There was no indication from the autopsy that there was anything anatomically wrong with him that would lead to premature death," Rogers said.

He had no signs of being addicted to street drugs, such as needle marks or disease. The testimony is important for the case, because if the jury decides that AEG is liable in his death, his expected lifespan will be used to calculate damages. Michael's lawyers will contend that he would have made billions of dollars during the rest of his life through several more world tours, merchandizing, recording and movies.

I also include an interview with Tom Mesereau, who represented Michael at the 2005 Arvizo trial. Tom makes some good points here, which also occurred to me, one of which is that if Michael was so unhealthy and messed up, why did AEG Live enter into a contract with him in the first place?

The Jackson family tried drug interventions

Michael Jackson in Honolulu 1997

On Thursday, Detective Orlando Martinez who took the lead investigating Michael's death in 2009, testified that Katherine Jackson told him the family had tried drug interventions for Michael, believing he was addicted to painkillers. Katherine told him her son refused any help, saying he didn't have a drug problem.Martinez said Katherine told him she believed her son was taking medicine for back pain and might have become addicted.

Martinez also said that five days before Michael died, his manager Frank Dileo called Dr Murray, told him Michael was sick, and implored him to have blood tests done, according to a voicemail retrieved by police from Murray's cellphone.

"I'm sure you're aware he had an episode last night," the message said. "He's sick. ... We gotta see what he's doing."

But this testimony doesn't specify when the drug interventions were attempted. Nobody has categorically stated that one was attempted at any time in 2009. There were rumours that an intervention was going to be attempted around 11th June 2009, but Michael resisted and agreed to a 'sober coach' accompanying him to London, see article here. As far as I'm aware, nobody has confirmed that any of this actually happened, and there has been no evidence so far of this sober coach ever being hired. Michael spent a week filming the video footage due to be shown in the 'This Is It' concerts in Culver City, around the time of the alleged intervention, and it would have been only a month until he was due to open in London. Not the ideal time for an intervention. It would have delayed the concerts for sure, and by then everything had already been arranged. I'm sure Michael was feeling the pressure to deliver to his fans and AEG.

Now I'd like to address some speculation in the media about a letter written in 2007, by the Jacksons, denying any drug intervention. It has been speculated that this letter harmed the case against AEG, as it showed that the family had since admitted they attempted interventions,  but denied it in the letter. This is a classic case of taking words out of context. The letter was written in 2007 specifically to address a 2007 article in People Magazine and other publications who said that Michael was dependent on painkillers and alcohol. The letter does not say the family have never staged an intervention. Michael's manager at the time, Raymone Bain, also issued a statement in June of 2007 denying Michael was on painkillers or in a wheelchair, in direct response to the media speculation at the time.

The way I see it, even if Michael did hide his drug intake, as AEG claim, there were enough people working directly with Michael in 2009 who knew of Michael's previous history, and who could ring alarm bells. Dileo, Karen Faye, Travis Payne, even Paul Gongaware had all worked with Michael before.Some were around during the 'Dangerous Tour' which was cancelled when Michael went into rehab. Dileo clearly saw the signs in 2009 and wanted action taken. Addicts often hide their addiction, or deny it. It's a well known fact. Addiction does not go away, it is managed.Anyone who has had an addiction in the past can lapse, and it is unlikely that the addict is going to ask for help. They are suffering from addiction. Saying that someone is an adult and therefore is responsible for their actions, does not work for people who have had an addiction.
Is this really your line of defense AEG?

Fans knew Conrad Murray was in debt four years ago!

Michael Jackson in Lyon 1997

A second witness called in the wrongful death lawsuit, Los Angeles Police Detective Orlando Martinez, said cell phone records showed that Dr. Conrad Murray called his girlfriend, Nicole Alvarez, at 1:08 p.m. on June 25, 2009, a minute after the ambulance carrying him and Michael Jackson left the Carolwood home for the UCLA Medical Center.

“Do you have an opinion as to the substance of that call?” Brian Panish, a lawyer representing Michael's mother and children asked Martinez.

“Yes,” the lawman replied, explaining that he had interviewed Alvarez and served a search warrant at her Santa Monica address.

“What was determined?” Panish asked.

“I found one piece of paper with Dr. Murray’s name — that had fallen behind the door of a cabinet — in the entire apartment (where) he’d been staying at (for) at least two months,” Martinez replied.

Panish asked whether he found that suspicious.

“Yes,” Martinez replied. “He was living there, and none of his stuff was there.”

Murray's 2011 trial revealed that he had had pharmacy shipments sent to Alvarez’s address, including Propofol.


Martinez told jurors his investigation led him to conclude that Murray was deep in debt at the time of Michael's death, giving him a financial motive to provide the anaesthetic Propofol as a treatment for insomnia.

On Tuesday, Martinez told jurors that Murray was about to lose his home to foreclosure and was approximately $500,000 in debt when he negotiated a $150,000-per-month agreement to act as Michael's personal physician for “This Is It”. The contract was never signed by Michael, however it was revealed by AEG lawyer Putnam that Michael Jackson was paying Murray during the last two months of his life. 

"He was paying for him during his entire time in Los Angeles and during the time we're talking about, Dr. Conrad Murray was being paid by Michael Jackson," he said. "We know this. We know this because the plaintiffs have said so."

Martinez covered more financial ground in testimony Wednesday, saying Murray had a history of unpaid rent on his Las Vegas office and was delinquent in paying his taxes.

“(It’s) just some more evidence of him being in financial dire straits,” Martinez said.

He said police also ran credit reports on Murray.

“If anyone would have run the credit report, they would have got the same information?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Martinez said.

Well, some of us fans investigated Murray in 2009, and we found out about his debt purely by looking on the internet. Yet there is an email from Randy Phillips, AEG Live President, to Kenny Ortega saying :

“This doctor is extremely successful (we check everyone out) and does not need this gig, so he is totally unbiased and ethical.”

Yeah. Right. 

Did Michael Jackson really look like a hospice patient?

Michael Jackson March 2009

Michael Jackson 1994

The first witness to testify in the Michael Jackson wrongful death lawsuit trial was a paramedic who responded to a 911 call at Michael's rented Carolwood home in June 2009.

Paramedic Richard Senneff testified Tuesday that Michael most likely died before the ambulance crew arrived on the scene three minutes after getting the emergency call.

Senneff described Michael as resembling someone who was suffering from a long-term “chronic” disease. 

“The patient looked very pale, very, very underweight.  I could see his ribs.  To me, he looked like someone who was at the end-stage of a long disease process,” Senneff testified.

This is the same testimony that Senneff gave at the Conrad Murray trial in 2011.

My view is also that Michael was very underweight by June 2009.

I know a lot of fans disagree with my view, but I'll explain my reasoning below.

Firstly, I have been a fan of Michael since 1973, and have seen photos of Michael as he grew from a skinny teenager into a slim adult. He was always slim. I know that.

Secondly, I spent many many years in and around the world of classical ballet dancers. Classical dancers are expected to be underweight their entire working life. I've stood next to hundreds and hundreds of dancers in class, when they are wearing only a leotard and tights, and spent time with them outside the theater. So I know what a healthy professional dancer body looks like.

I also know that a dancer can lose a lot of weight, if they are performing a demanding dance role regularly over a period of weeks. It's something they have to watch out for and accommodate, so that they do not lose too much weight and lose their strength and stamina along with it.

Watching rehearsal footage from 24th June 2009 in the 'This Is It' film, it immediately struck me that at times Michael looked very thin and seemed to try and conserve his energy between songs. This starkly contrasts with footage of Michael rehearsing 10 years or so prior, where he is constantly on the move, even between songs, and is running all over the stage.  My knowledge of dancers and my experience of sitting in ballet rehearsals told me that Michael was in no fit state to start a series of concerts. I might have expected him to be thin and tired some weeks or months into the shows, but not before the shows had begun.

I selected the two photos of Michael above, as he is wearing similar outfits, but I think you can see that his hips and legs are a lot thinner in 2009. 

I read that Michael's waist measurement in the 1980s was 32". 

In 2009 it was 28". 

His weight was 136lbs in 2009. I've checked some height/weight tables specifically for men, and they say that man of 5'9" should be between 142 and 176lbs, depending on their frame, so Michael was definitely underweight.

Check out these videos of Michael rehearsing 'Billie Jean' from 1992 and 2009 and see the difference for yourself.