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Neverland manager admits lie

In a blow to defense, 18-year employee of Michael Jackson says he knew about children sleeping in bedroom of pop star

BY TINA SUSMAN | STAFF CORRESPONDENT

May 11, 2005

SANTA MARIA, Calif. - In a tension-filled cross-examination, the manager of Michael Jackson's Neverland Valley Ranch admitted yesterday that he lied to law enforcement officials when he told them he knew nothing about children sleeping in the pop star's bedroom.

In a repeat of an occurrence seen frequently during the first phase of Jackson's child-molestation trial, when prosecution witnesses ended up helping the defense, this time the defense witness appeared to help out the prosecution.

"They got him to admit he had lied to investigators, and once you get a witness to admit to lying, the jury has a basis for not believing anything else," former prosecutor Jean Rosenbluth, a University of Southern California law professor, said of the witness, Joe Marcus. "That really to some point taints his testimony."

Marcus, a Jackson employee for 18 years, seemed reluctant to respond and often sat silently for several seconds as prosecutor Gordon Auchincloss portrayed him as a fierce loyalist who would lie to protect his boss.

When asked about a November 2003 interview with sheriff's deputies who had raided Neverland in search of material to bolster child-molestation claims, Marcus conceded that he had been questioned about children sharing Jackson's bedroom and denied knowing anything about it.

But when asked by Auchincloss: "Do you have any knowledge of children sleeping in Mr. Jackson's room?" he replied quietly: "Yes."

In a particularly striking moment, Auchincloss recited a list of names of young boys - including at least four allegedly groped by Jackson - and asked if the pop star had "special bonds" with each of them. Marcus quietly replied "yes" after each name was read.

He insisted that Jackson also formed such bonds with girls and women, but struggled to come up with names other than movie star Elizabeth Taylor and the sisters of two of the boys Jackson befriended.

"I'm sure there are others," Marcus said when pressed for evidence Jackson had tight friendships with anyone besides young boys.

"Liza Minelli has been there [to Neverland], and they seem to be good friends," he finally said, eliciting a snide comeback from Auchincloss.

"OK, so we're up to two. Any others?" the prosecutor said before the defense objected.

Marcus' testimony was to continue today, and former child star Macaulay Culkin was expected to take the stand soon afterward to deny prosecution witness' claims that he was among boys molested by Jackson in the early 1990s.

Rosenbluth and other legal analysts, though, said his testimony would not necessarily counteract the potential damage from Marcus' time on the witness stand.

"That was very powerful, that litany of listing boy after boy after boy," said Connecticut prosecutor Susan Filan, referring to the "special friends" that Marcus confirmed. The list included Culkin, who has insisted nothing sexual occurred with Jackson.