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Friday, September 04, 2009 LOS ANGELES: More than two months after his death from a drug overdose, Michael Jackson will be laid to rest here Thursday in a private funeral for family and friends at a star-studded Los Angeles cemetery. Jackson, who died aged 50 on June 25, will be entombed in an ornate mausoleum at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park, where Hollywood icons such as Humphrey Bogart, James Stewart, Spencer Tracy and Walt Disney are buried. No details of the 45-minute service have been released, although reports Thursday said soul diva Aretha Franklin could sing at the service as mourners said a poignant final farewell to the "King of Pop." Jackson's children -- Prince Michael, 12, 11-year-old Paris and Prince Michael II, 7 -- would leave notes in their father's coffin, reports said. Messages reading "Daddy we love you, we miss you," would be placed in Jackson's gold-plated casket alongside his trademark single white glove. Close Jackson friends Dia...

NEW YORK — Thousands of Michael Jackson fans danced the rain away in a Brooklyn park on Saturday at a party hosted by filmmaker Spike Lee, marking what would have been the 51st birthday of the late pop star. Crowds of partygoers streamed into Prospect Park late Saturday afternoon, many wearing fedoras, sporting white gloves and showing off other Jackson-esque outfits. DJs spun Jackson's hits one after the other as people danced and sang along. Dozens of hawkers wandered through the crowd with T-shirts, buttons, posters and homemade memorabilia. "I was just like everyone else. I loved his talent," said Lee, who directed two music videos for Jackson in 1996. He also reminisced how Jackson had visited him in his home in Brooklyn to talk about their music video collaboration. The day was also designated Michael "King of Pop" Jackson Memorial Day by Brooklyn borough president Marty Markowitz. "We all know Michael Jackson had fans around the world, but we all kn...

Saturday, August 29, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson's death was declared a homicide by Los Angeles coroners on Friday as they revealed the singer had a lethal cocktail of six different drugs in his body when he died. Ending several weeks of feverish speculation following Jackson's sudden death in Los Angeles on June 25, the county coroner's office issued a brief statement ruling that the superstar's death was unlawful. The statement said that while "acute intoxication" from the powerful anesthetic propofol was the primary cause of death, Jackson, 50, had also suffered from the effects of other drugs in his system. As well as propofol, powerful drugs including lorazepam, midazolam, diazepam, lidocaine and ephedrine were found in Jackson's body. The coroner's statement said police investigators and public prosecutors had ordered that the full toxicology report concerning Jackson be withheld until further notice. Jackson's family welcomed the findi...

Saturday, August 22, 2009 LOS ANGELES: The date of the funeral for pop legend Michael Jackson has been changed to September 3, the singer's spokesman said Friday.Jackson was scheduled to be laid to rest August 29, on what would have been his 51st birthday.The private ceremony will still take place at Glendale Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, according to a statement from Ken Sunshine.No reason was given for the change in date. The ceremony "will be limited to family and close friends," the statement said. Jackson died June 25 of cardiac arrest. The famed entertainer was 50.The release date for the movie drawing on Jackson's rehearsal footage was announced Thursday. "Michael Jackson: This Is It" will run in theaters worldwide for two weeks only beginning October 28, according to media. Tickets for the film go on sale Sunday, September 27, Sony said in a news release Thursday. "Audiences will be given a privileged and private look at th...

Friday, August 21, 2009 LOS ANGELES: A film about Michael Jackson titled Michael Jackson THIS IS IT will be shown in cinemas around the world for two weeks starting in late October.Tickets should be available from 27 September, with the film opening in cinemas on October 28. The studio confirmed earlier reports that Kenny Ortega (High School Musical) would direct it. Ortega was also supposed to stage Jackson's comeback concerts planned for July in London. The singer died suddenly of heart failure in Los Angeles on June 25. In early August, a judge gave the go-ahead for a contract for the film between the studio, concert promoter AEG Live and Jackson's estate. The film is expected to contain video footage from Jackson's last concert rehearsals filmed shortly before his death. Friends and colleagues are also thought likely to appear. "It is a very private, exclusive look into a creative genius's world," Ortega said.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson will be buried on August 29, the day the King of Pop would have turned 51, his family said in a statement on Tuesday. The private ceremony -- more than two months after his June 25 death from heart failure -- will take place in Los Angeles and "will be limited to family and close friends" the statement said. "Michael Jackson will be laid to rest at Holly Terrace in the Grand Mausoleum at Glendale Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale (California) on Saturday, August 29, 2009, at 10:00 am (1700 GMT)." The announcement came as investigators said they were still weeks away from reaching a conclusion explaining how Jackson died, a US reported. Authorities are investigating whether prescription drugs played a role in the death of Jackson, 50, and have focused on the role played by his personal physician Conrad Murray.Murray was present at the time Jackson died and reportedly has admitted prescribing powerful anesth...

Tuesday, August 18, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson's father, Joe, says the late pop star will be buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Los Angeles on what would have been his 51st birthday.Jackson told the New York Daily News his son, who died June 25, is due to be interred the morning of Aug. 29. The burial plans reportedly were completed in the past few days. A public funeral was held for Michael Jackson July 7.The results of an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the recording artist's death have not yet been released.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009 CULVER CITY: Beginning October 30th, the world will have a front-row seat for Michael Jackson's final concert, as Sony Pictures Entertainment and Sony Music Entertainment release Michael Jackson's This Is It.This Is It is being produced with the full support of The Estate of Michael Jackson and will be drawn from hundreds of hours of rehearsal and behind-the-scenes footage, captured in high definition with state-of-the-art digital sound as the late singer was preparing for his concert series in London. The film, which will also offer select sequences in 3-D, will provide a unique career retrospective and feature interviews with some of Jackson's closest friends and creative collaborators, said michaeljackson.com.The announcement was made by Michael Lynton, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Amy Pascal, Co-Chairman of the studio, Rolf Schmidt-Holtz, Chief Executive Officer of Sony Music Entertainment, and Rob Stri...

Saturday, August 08, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson's estate should gain "close to $100 million" through contracts negotiated since the pop star's death, Jackson's brother told US Television.Jermaine Jackson said brother Michael's resting place is still undetermined.Jermaine Jackson, in a wide-ranging interview said his mother, Katherine Jackson, has not decided on Jackson's final resting place. He said he prefers the Neverland Ranch."I'm just concerned about security and being secure in a peaceful setting," he said.He stopped short of revealing if his mother has hinted her preference, saying, "At the end of the day, she will make the final decision." Jermaine Jackson said he had no reason to believe his brother was addicted to drugs, a suspicion that detectives revealed when they requested a warrant to search Dr. Conrad Murray's Las Vegas, Nevada, home and office."I have never seen him act abnormal around me or never k...

LOS ANGELES — The insurance taken out on Michael Jackson for his London concert series does not cover cancellations if the pop star was found to have illegally possessed drugs or was involved in the "illicit taking of drugs," according to a copy of the policy provided Friday to The Associated Press. It was not immediately clear whether any medications Jackson was taking would negate a payout up to $17.5 million, which would ultimately benefit his estate. Jackson's doctor administered multiple sedatives along with the powerful anesthetic propofol, a potentially lethal combination, hours before the singer died June 25, a law enforcement official who requested anonymity because the death investigation is ongoing told the AP. The insurance policy, covering the first 13 shows of the 50-show run, was taken out by Jackson and concert promoter AEG Live in April. Such a policy and its provisions are considered standard for events on the scale of the one for which Jackson was prepa...

Tuesday, August 04, 2009 LOS ANGELES: A Los Angeles judge named Michael Jackson's mother as permanent guardian of the star's children Monday, ignoring a surprise late bid by the singer's dermatologist to have a say in their upbringing. Lawyers for Katherine Jackson, 79, and the King of Pop's ex-wife Debbie Rowe had last week agreed details of custody arrangements concerning children Prince Michael, 12, Paris, 11 and Prince Michael II, 7. But what was expected to be a straightforward hearing to approve the agreement on Monday took a bizarre turn when an attorney for Jackson's skin doctor Arnold Klein appeared at the hearing. Lawyer Mark Vincent Kaplan said Klein wanted to "have a voice" in issues concerning the children's "education, healthcare and welfare." Asked repeatedly by Judge Mitchell Beckloff to state what Klein's interest was, Kaplan said it was due to his client's "longstanding relationship with the children and longsta...

Friday, July 31, 2009 LAS VEGAS,: Investigators who raided the Las Vegas home and office of Michael Jackson's doctor Conrad Murray were seeking evidence of manslaughter, an unsealed search warrant revealed Thursday.Federal agents and police were also hunting for possible evidence of unprofessional conduct, "prescribing or treating an addict", excessive prescribing and evidence of prescriptions of propofol, the warrant showed.The 13-page document shed more light on the direction of the probe by referencing manslaughter charges and allowing for a search for records related to "shipping orders, distribution lists, use records relating to the purchase, transfer, receiving, ordering, delivery and storage of propofol."It also made public 19 possible aliases used by Jackson and his doctors, one of which was Prince Jackson, the name of the pop star's two sons.The documents show Clark County District Judge Timothy Williams authorized the searches, in which officers ...

Tuesday, July 28, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson's personal physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, administered a powerful drug that authorities believe killed the singer, a source close to the Jackson family and with knowledge of the investigation confirmed to CNN on Monday. Murray allegedly gave Jackson the anesthetic propofol in the 24 hours before he died, the source said.The doctor's attorneys had no comment on the report but in the past have said Murray never prescribed or administered anything that could have killed the pop star.Murray was the doctor who was at Jackson's home when the pop star died on June 25.Last week, Texas authorities searched Murray's Houston medical office and storage unit, looking for "evidence of the offense of manslaughter," according to court documents.Ed Chernoff, a Houston lawyer hired by Murray soon after Jackson's death, confirmed at the time that Los Angeles Police detectives and federal Drug Enforcement Administration agen...

Saturday, July 25, 2009 NEW YORK: According to a local magazine, Michael Jackson wore a prosthetic nose and witnesses at a Los Angeles morgue report that it was missing from the King of Pop’s body. Instead, left behind was a small, dark hole.The magazine, which hit newstands Friday, reports that Jackson wore a prosthetic nose to hide the effects of numerous plastic surgeries.According to the Mirror, Jackson’s former housekeeper, Adrian McManus said, “His nose was a problem. He wore plasters around the side to cover or support it. It was severely cave in. In his closet he had a jar of fake noses and stage glue, which he told me he used of disguises. But some were similar to his real nose, just without the hole.”Jackson may have had at least six nose jobs, and reports indicate it was because he believed he looked too much like his father.In a 1993 interview with Oprah Winfrey, Jackson spoke about the emotional and physical abuse he claims to have suffered at the hands of his father, Joe...

Saturday, July 25, 2009 VIENNA: Michael Jackson would have made more important achievements as a musician and philanthropist had his life not been cut short, his brother Jermaine said Friday, who was in Vienna to receive a posthumous award on behalf of the US pop star. At the Save the World Awards, which are given out for the first time this year, Michael Jackson was selected because of his charity work, the organizers said. Jermaine and his musical siblings were raised in the spirit of helping others, he said at a press conference: "Our message was to try to heal the world, to change the world."Michael Jackson's three children would now also brought up with a humanitarian philosophy in mind, and would not be pushed towards any specific career, Michael's older brother indicated. "We feel that it is more important for them to be raised in the right way" so that they would become "great human beings," he said. Their grandmother Katherine has tempora...

Us Weekly got its hands on previously unreleased video of Michael Jackson's hair catching on fire during the filming of a Pepsi commercial in 1984. The disturbing video, posted at usmagazine.com feeds long-held speculation that drug treatments Jackson received after the accident led to his addiction to prescription drugs, including powerful painkillers. Jackson himself said as much in 2003. "As you may already know, after my tour ended I remained outside the country undergoing treatment for a dependency on pain medication," he said then. "This medication was initially prescribed for the excruciating pain that I was suffering after recent reconstructive surgery on my scalp." The accident happened while Jackson and his brothers were filming a commercial for Pepsi at L.A.'s Shrine Auditorium on Jan. 27, 1984. The footage shows pyrotechnics exploding around Jackson as he prepares to walk down a set of stairs onto the stage. Flames, that apparently ignite the ha...

Saturday, July 11, 2009 LONDON: The leaked toxicology report of Michael Jackson claims that the pop star had lethal levels of potent painkillers and drugs in his body at the time of his death, triggering suspicion that it may be a case of homicide. Jackson was on a diet of deadly cocktail potent enough to have killed a normal person instantly but his body had developed a tolerance due to the longtime use of huge doses, the British newspaper Sun claimed quoting the findings of his preliminary toxicology reports.Apart from high levels of Demerol, a strong painkiller and heroin substitute Methadone, Jackson's blood tests found high doses of antianxiety drug Xanax, according to the leaked toxicology report submitted to the Los Angeles county coroner's office, the paper said.Lower levels of powerful anaesthetic drug Propofol was also present in Jackson's body. Jackson's close aides, the pop star, who suffered from insomnia, used the medicine as a sleeping pill. Another medi...

Saturday, July 11, 2009 LOS ANGELES: A Los Angeles court delayed the custody hearing for Michael Jackson's three children, which will now take place on July 20.The hearing was scheduled to take place on July 13, but according to a court statement, it has been delayed at the request of Jackson's mother and his ex-wife Deborah Rowe."The guardianship hearing originally scheduled for Monday, July 13, 2009 will be continued to July 20, 2009," a statement said.On June 29 a Los Angeles court named the star's 79-year-old mother Katherine Jackson as the temporary guardian of Prince Michael, Paris and younger brother Prince Michael II, who was born to a secret surrogate."All prior orders remain in full force and effect, with Katherine Jackson as temporary guardian of the children," the court said. But Rowe, who was married to Jackson from 1996 to 1999, has said she planned to fight for custody of her two children with the pop star.

Saturday, July 11, 2009 INDIANA: Michael Jackson's boyhood hometown bade farewell to the King of Pop with a celebration of his life and music. More than 6,000 people showed up for an upbeat memorial event that featured performers singing and dancing to his hits, video montages of Jackson and comments from the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Gary's mayor and people who knew Michael Jackson when his family lived in Gary. Mayor Rudy Clay said Jackson had made the city known worldwide and told the crowd that he has moved on to a better place.

Thursday, July 09, 2009 LOS ANGELES: Michael's body was filled with injection marks at the time of his death. It is speculated that the singer may have had an injection of the drug Propofol, a powerful anesthesia. The dangerous medication was found in MJ's house after his death, and various medical experts have said there is absolutely no medical justification for Michael to have had this drug in his home. It is used to put people under before surgery and is administered through an IV.It seems Michael wanted to use the drug to cure his insomnia -- and that he had been a bit of an anesthesia junkie. Sources say the LAPD has asked the DEA to assist them in its investigation into multiple doctors who may have treated Michael and prescribed Propofol.And, if it is found that a shot of the drug is what caused Michael to go into cardiac arrest and die, serious criminal charges could be filed against the doctor who gave it to him.