Family rallies to Jackson at court

As a white-suited Michael Jackson looked on, the prosecutor he once sang of as “a cold man” was grilled in court Monday by lawyers attempting to have key evidence suppressed from the entertainer’s upcoming trial on child molestation charges.

Jackson, his parents, and six of his brothers and sisters, also clad in white in a show of support, came to watch as Santa Barbara District Atty. Tom Sneddon underwent an unusual interrogation from Jackson’s lead attorney, Thomas Mesereau.

Attorneys for Jackson contend that Santa Barbara officials illegally raided the office of a Beverly Hills private investigator who worked for Mark Geragos, one of Jackson’s previous attorneys. They argue that the search last November violated the confidentiality between attorney and client, making seized videotapes and other materials inadmissible in court.

Monday’s hearing was to decide whether this evidence will be allowed at trial.

Sneddon insisted on the witness stand that at the time of the search he knew of only an extremely limited relationship between Geragos and the private investigator, Bradley Miller.

Without evidence that Miller worked for Geragos on the child-molestation accusations against Jackson, Sneddon said the search was proper.

Hammering home their contention that Sneddon must have at least suspected Miller was an investigator for Geragos, Jackson’s attorneys pointed to several letters between Geragos and William Dickerman, an attorney for the mother of Jackson’s accuser.

The letters, which prosecutors had gathered as evidence, dealt with furniture that Miller had placed in storage after the boy’s family left their East Los Angeles apartment and pitched camp at Neverland, Jackson’s rural estate.

Several of the letters referred to Miller. One was written by Miller to the mother’s attorney and copied to Geragos.

“So you never drew a connection between Geragos and Miller?” Mesereau asked. “It never dawned on you that Mr. Miller, as a private investigator, might be working with Mr. Geragos?”

“That’s absolutely correct.” said Sneddon, adding that one reason for the search was to clarify Miller’s role in the tangle of accusations against Jackson and some of his employees. Sneddon said the boy’s mother had told his investigators that Miller worked for Jackson and had threatened her family if they decided not to participate in a “rebuttal video” to clear the singer’s reputation.

While defending the office raid, Sneddon acknowledged two major mistakes that occurred months later.

In a telephone conference with defense attorneys last month, he said he had known before the search that Miller worked for Geragos. The next morning, he called to reverse himself, explaining that he had had a long day and had been angered by a subordinate’s scheduling error.

In the other instance, he blamed a fellow prosecutor for wrongly suggesting in a court document that the office suspected Miller of being a key investigator for Geragos. He said he learned that was the case from Geragos only in December–weeks after the search.

Dozens of Jackson’s fans turned out at the courthouse to show their support for the singer, including one who set up a keyboard and played “Thriller.”

Amid chants of “innocent,” Jackson emerged from a bus surrounded by family members and bodyguards. The singer flashed a peace sign over his back and disappeared into the courthouse.