In Leaving Neverland, Michael Jackson accusers Wade Robson and James Safechuck painstakingly recount the alleged sexual abuse they say they faced at the hands of Jackson when they were children, both while on tour with the pop star and during visits to his famed Neverland Ranch. Both men go into graphic detail, describing various locations and circumstances in which they were allegedly abused as minors. All of which prompts a couple questions: where were Jackson’s staff, handlers, and security detail when the abuse was allegedly being perpetrated? And how could they, as well as his friends and family, ignore the reported stream of young boys Jackson entertained in his inner sanctum?
As Vanity Fair’s Maureen Orth bluntly explained in her 1994 investigative feature “Nightmare in Neverland,”, Jackson was “such a highly prized corporate moneymaking machine, such a valuable product . . . that almost no one, especially those C.E.O.s and moguls who make millions off him, has ever really questioned his motives: why this reclusive man-child with no known history of romantic relationships prefers to live a fantasy life in the company of children.” Additionally, any staff member who spoke out against the superstar—who was worth an estimated $150 million in the 90s—jeopardized their employment. Most guests to Neverland Ranch were also forced to sign confidentiality agreements, ensuring they would not speak to press or write about what went on inside Jackson’s Santa Barbara estate.
And, as Orth later wrote in her 2004 feature “Neverland’s Lost Boys,” Jackson used other intimidation tactics as well: “In 1993 armed members of tough South-Central L.A. gangs, including the notorious Bloods, were transported to Neverland. The employment of these toughs was said to have sent a strong message to Neverland employees who might have considered cooperating in the Jordie Chandler investigation, not to mention the subliminal message it gave out to other boys and their families who might have been thinking of coming forward.”
There were some people from Jackson’s inner circle—family members, friends, and former employees—who did speak out against Jackson, but their credibility was, in most cases, swiftly dismantled by Jackson’s high-powered team of lawyers. As a reporter for The Observer noted in 2005, “At no stage did any witness or victim report Jackson to the police. Or try to stop the alleged abuse. They went to lawyers, tabloid editors, and television reporters, but never to social services.”
Ahead, a look back at the members of Jackson’s inner circle who spoke out against the singer—and the ways in which many of them were called into question.
La Toya Jackson, Michael’s older sister: In 1993, La Toya broke with the family’s united front—that Jackson did not abuse 13-year-old Jordan Chandler, as he had been accused of doing—to make a bombshell claim. During a televised interview with Today’s Katie Couric, La Toya alleged that her family knew something was amiss with Michael. Though she did not provide concrete evidence to support her claims, La Toya said that her and Michael’s mother, Katherine, had been “outraged” to discover “checks that were written to . . . the parents of the little boys that would sleep over.” La Toya claimed the checks were found around 1984, and “were for a substantial amount of money.” La Toya claimed that Katherine said, in response to the discovery, “I can’t stand this. He’s nothing but a fag.”
Asked why Katherine had not come forward, La Toya explained, “She denies it, because she has no [financial] support [otherwise]. In other words, if she were to go and tell the truth, Michael would drop everything, and she would probably be out on the streets. So she has to stand by him.”
La Toya also held a press conference in Tel Aviv, where she told reporters, “I just think Michael needs help . . . This has been going on since 1981, and it’s not just one child.” She claimed that she could no longer “be a silent collaborator of his crimes against small, innocent children . . . If I remain silent, then that means that I feel the guilt and humiliation that these children are feeling, and I think it’s very wrong.”
After a period of estrangement from her family, La Toya then claimed that she had been forced to say these things about Michael by her then-husband. After recanting, she subsequently mended her relationship with the Jackson family—though La Toya’s sensational claims against her brother did not end with that marriage, or even with Michael’s 2009 death. CNN reported in 2009 that La Toya had reportedly been paid to give an interview alleging that her brother had been murdered.
Though he later denied saying it, the London tabloid Daily Express also quoted Jackson’s brother Jermaine in the 90s as questioning the validity of the claims against Michael: “I love him, but you have to wonder if there might not be some truth in it.”
Blanca Francia, who worked as Jackson’s maid from 1986 to 1991: In a 1993 deposition, Francia told investigators that she had not seen Jackson touch any boys inappropriately. But in 2005, Francia’s story changed—she accused Jackson of showering naked with Wade Robson. According to a Los Angeles Times report of her 2005 testimony, “Once, when [Francia] was cleaning Jackson’s bedroom, she said, she saw Jackson and a child she believes was [Robson] in the shower. The boy’s neon-green Spider-Man underwear was on the floor near Jackson’s white briefs, she said. She said she was familiar with their undergarments from doing their laundry.”
Francia added that she also became worried about Jackson’s behavior around her own son, Jason, “whom she often took to work at Jackson's request.” Jason, aged 24 at the time of the 2005 trial, also testified that Jackson sexually fondled him three times when he was a child. His mother was reportedly paid a $2 million settlement by Jackson. Her credibility came under question when it was revealed that Francia had also reportedly been paid $20,000 for an interview with Hard Copy after leaving Neverland.
Asked why she did not share the shower anecdote during her 1993 testimony, Francia replied, “At the time I guess I was tired and nervous.”
Jackson’s former business adviser Myung-Ho Lee: Speaking to Orth for her 2004 Vanity Fair feature, Lee said that, during his travels around the globe with Jackson, “He had a number of guests in his suite for the night—they were always boys in the 10- to 13-year-old range.” Lee added, “I’ve never seen him share a suite with an older teen boy, a girl, or an older female. I thought it very strange.” He also told Orth about Jackson’s legal tactics over the years: “Michael is very vindictive if anybody tries to do anything about him . . . If he has the upper hand, he will destroy you.”
Ralph Chacon, a former security guard of Jackson’s: Chacon testified during the 2005 trial that he saw Jackson perform oral sex on a young boy, aged 9 or 10, after Jackson and the boy had bathed in a Jacuzzi at Neverland Ranch. “I saw that Mr. Jackson was caressing the boy’s hair,” Chacon alleged, adding that, about a month later, he saw Jackson again kissing the same boy, and putting his hand over the boy’s “crotch.” Jackson’s defense team, however, chipped away at Chacon’s credibility, according to The Washington Post, by asking the former security guard about “a wrongful-termination lawsuit he had filed against Jackson, in which he’d allegedly hoped to make more than $16 million.” Chacon and a former maid were also found guilty of stealing belongings from Jackson’s estate, amounting to more than $50,000, and of accepting money in exchange for a tabloid interview.
Adrian Marie McManus, a former maid of Jackson’s: Like Chacon, McManus testified during the 2005 trial that she saw Jackson touching boys inappropriately—including Macaulay Culkin. (Culkin has long denied any appropriate behavior at Neverland.) Jackson’s defense team pointed out that McManus had been part of the wrongful-termination lawsuit filed against Jackson, in hopes of making more than $16 million. Like Chacon, McManus was also found guilty of stealing items from Jackson’s home and accepting money in exchange for a tabloid interview.
Philippe and Stella Lemarque, a French couple who cooked at Neverland for nearly a year: According to Orth’s “Nightmare in Neverland”, the couple claimed to have witnessed Jackson taking “sexual advantage of young guests, specifically Macaulay Culkin, who has denied that anything went on between him and Michael. The Lemarques described on tape Jackson’s alleged modus operandi: keeping the kids up all night with sound-and-light shows, games, and videos until they were so overstimulated that they barely noticed his fondling.”
During the 2005 trial, Philippe claimed that he witnessed one incident of inappropriate conduct upon delivering French fries to Jackson around 3 A.M. According to The Observer’s description of his testimony, “When he entered Jackson’s bedroom he saw [Jackson] and Culkin playing an arcade game with Jackson’s hand down the young boy’s underpants. ‘I was shocked. I almost dropped the French fries,’ Lemarque told the court.” (Culkin has repeatedly insisted that no abuse took place.)
The couple lost credibility when it was discovered that they had tried to sell their story to The National Enquirer, allegedly altering details of their story in an attempt to get more money from tabloid outlets.
__ Eddie Reynoza, a featured dancer in the “Thriller” music video who was once close friends with Jackson:__ “He’s had little boys around for nine years straight, 24 hours around the clock,” Reynoza told Orth in her 1994 feature “Nightmare in Neverland.” “People in show business couldn’t understand how long it took to get the talk going. The public is 100 years behind on [the allegations].” Reynoza added that others in Jackson’s inner circle “looked the other way. They were afraid of being fired.”
