Emotional Katherine Jackson addresses jurors for first time

Emotional Katherine Jackson addresses jurors for first time

The matriarch of the Jackson family testifies in the wrongful-death case against AEG Live that she 'lost everything' when her son Michael died in 2009.An emotional Katherine Jackson spoke to jurors about her pop star son for the first time Friday, smiling as she described the way he danced as a baby and later weeping as she recalled his death, saying she "lost everything." The 83-year-old matriarch held attorney Brian Panish's hand as she walked to the stand, one of the most anticipated witnesses in the wrongful-death case between her family and entertainment giant AEG Live over Michael Jackson's death. Jackson and three of her grandchildren — Prince, Paris and Blanket — are suing the company, alleging AEG Live negligently hired and controlled the physician who gave the singer a fatal dose of the anesthetic propofol as he was preparing for his "This Is It" comeback tour in 2009. AEG contends it was Michael Jackson who hired Dr. Conrad Murray. Jackson has watched much of the months-long trial from the downtown L.A. courtroom's front row, and said she has struggled to remain composed as she listened to testimony about her seventh child. "My son was sick and nobody tried to help him," she told AEG Live attorney Marvin Putnam. "I want to know the truth of what happened to him." The civil trial has cast a harsh spotlight on some of the most private details of Michael Jackson's life — his erratic behavior, his drug use, his dramatic weight loss and his overwhelming fear of failure. Katherine Jackson defended her son against AEG executives, who called Jackson "lazy" and "the freak" in emails. "The most difficult thing is to sit here in this court and listen to all the bad things they say about my son," Jackson said, later adding: "A lot of the things that have been said here are not the truth. And he's not here to speak for himself." When Panish asked how she had been affected by her son's death, Katherine Jackson broke down. "When a mother loses a child," she said, crying. "No one knows until it happens to them. That's the worst thing that could happen to a person, losing a child. "I lost my mother, my father and my sister … but when I lost Michael, I lost everything," she said. Jackson described Michael as a shy, sensitive person who cared deeply for others and loved music from the time he was a baby. She and her husband, Joe, raised nine children in a four-room home in Gary, Ind. "When all the kids were dancing around, he was in my arms and he couldn't be still. He was dancing to the music," she said. "And when he started to walk, he would still dance." Though her son always sang around the house, Jackson said, it wasn't until 5-year-old Michael sang "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" at a school program that she realized just how talented he was. When Michael was about 6, she said, he joined his older brothers in singing competitions at local high schools — losing only once because people "were sick of seeing the Jacksons win." The boys wore suits made by their mother and rehearsed at home, pushing the living room furniture back to the walls and dancing in the middle of the floor. The Jackson 5's fame grew, and the brothers signed a record deal with Motown in 1968. But it was his solo career that catapulted Michael Jackson to stardom. Katherine Jackson smiled as she described her son's generosity, saying he provided for her financially and the two were always "very close." She said he even named the train at his Neverland Ranch "Katherine." Jackson, a Jehovah's witness, said she was doing "field service" — going door to door to share her faith — and returned home to a message from her husband the day their son died. One of the fans camped outside their son's home had called Joe Jackson, saying someone had left on a gurney "completely covered up," she testified. When she got to the hospital, she said, she found her son's staff and a man she later learned was Murray "pacing back and forth." It was the singer's manager who finally broke the news, she said. "I just started screaming," she said. Paris, now 15, was especially distraught, her grandmother said. "She was screaming, looking up at the sky and said, 'Daddy, I want to go with you,'" Katherine Jackson recalled. "'I can't live without you. I'm going with you.'" In the days after her son's death, Jackson said she went with Paris to find a "broken heart" necklace. The girl went to the morgue, "hung one heart around her father's neck" and kept the other half, her grandmother said. Jackson now shares guardianship of the three children. Paris has "had the hardest time" coping with her father's death, she said, acknowledging the teen has received medical help and been hospitalized. Katherine Jackson watched as a video was played for jurors, showing footage of her grandchildren set to a recording of her son singing "Speechless." He wrote the song about being a father, she said. "Mrs. Jackson, do you miss your son?" Panish asked when the video ended.



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Lindsay Lohan switches rehab sites after telling dad about fear of drugs at Ford center

Lindsay Lohan switches rehab sites after telling dad about fear of drugs at Ford center 

The price of a private room at Cliffside, Lindsay Lohan’s new rehab facility, is a whopping $68,000 a month. But the troubled starlet was left with no choice but to transfer there after leaving the Betty Ford Center, because she claims it was a drug-infested place that couldn’t help her, LiLo’s father, Michael Lohan, tells Confidenti@l. “There are drugs all over the place inside there,” Lohan says his daughter told him about the clinic. “It was a big problem and that’s why she wanted out.” Lohan says he’s been in constant contact with his 26-year-old daughter since she entered rehab in May. Lohan also tells us that Lindsay said she witnessed a relapse inside the Betty Ford Center, after drugs were allegedly smuggled in to another patient. “When Lindsay was tested, she was clean,” Lohan said. “She didn’t want to be around it and immediately asked for a transfer.” But Lindsay is in for a rough ride at Cliffside, reports the Daily News’ Nancy Dillon, because the facility’s founder, Richard Taite, is a former addict and best-selling author who had sharp words about Lohan after her arrest for allegedly punching a woman at a Manhattan nightclub last November. The case was never prosecuted. “She is definitely spiraling out of control,” Taite told the media. “She is continually getting into trouble and any reasonable person can tell she needs help.” He said Lindsay was “walking a slippery slope” and predicted that if she didn’t clean up her act, she would “in all probability, seriously hurt herself or someone else.” Taite is also a vocal critic of Adderall, a prescription drug for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) that Lindsay has used for years. His boutique clinic has just 18 beds. Lindsay left Betty Ford in Rancho Mirage, Calif., this week for Cliffside, in Malibu. For a week she will be in “blackout,” Michael Lohan tells Confidenti@l. That’s a period starting upon arrival that prohibits interactions with friends and family. “I’m not sure how she is doing, because I can’t talk to her in the blackout,” Lohan said. “Going to visit again next week.” Lohan had entered her court-ordered rehab on May 3, after, of course, a typical Lindsay day of confusion about where and when she’d be checking in. LiLo is expected back on the streets in early August, after 90 days of rehab. A Betty Ford spokesperson said the center could not comment on the allegations, citing federal confidentiality laws. ANDREW H. WALKER/GETTY IMAGES Martha Stewart says she knows what a good thing in the joint world is. THIS IS HOW MARTHA’S ROLLIN’ Now here’s a Martha Stewart baking handbook we’d like to see. “As I was driving here tonight there was so much traffic, and there was a stupid ice cream truck in front of us, and as we stopped there was a girl and guy smoking joints. I said, ‘Boy those are sloppy joints.’ ” Stewart told Andy Cohen at a 92Y Talks Q&A. She added, “Of course I know how to roll a joint! Not that I ever do.” Of course not, Martha. Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer can get the circulation going in HBO’s ‘True Blood.’ MOYER’S NUDES UPDATE It is the vampire show famed for its nudity as much as its gore. And “True Blood’s” leading man Stephen Moyer admits he has had loads of embarrassing moments on set, all connected to his nude scenes. “There are all sorts of inappropriate fallout situations, which we have all been through,” he told Confidenti@l ahead of the show’s sixth-season premiere Sunday night on HBO. “John Gielgud once said to his leading ladies. ‘I apologize to you if nothing happens below and I also apologize if something does.’ “Given that I am naked for a great chunk of it, I am a sensitive lover,” says Moyer. Meanwhile, spare a thought for co-star Joe Manganiello’s gorgeous girlfriend Bridget Peters, who could only stand and watch as an army of women lined up to have a snap with her hunk at the ArcLight Cinemas in Hollywood. Peters waited patiently as he smiled and put his arms around partygoers and posed for cell-phone pictures. Asked about the attention, modest Manganiello said, “It could be worse.” TIMBERLAKE JOINS MYSPACE PROGRAM Justin Timberlake, who played Napster founder Sean Parker in “The Social Network,” hosted a crowd including Olivia Wilde and Vanessa Hudgens at a MySpace relaunch party in L.A. Wednesday. (Timberlake’s an investor in the company.) At one point, the fire department briefly stopped letting people into the crowded El Rey Theatre, leaving latecomers like actress Jennifer Morrison waiting outside. GARCES READY FOR BIG EVENT Paula Garces, the Colombian-born American actress from “The Harold and Kumar” series, surprised guests at the See by Chloe Fragrance launch at Industria Studios in the West Village Wednesday night when she announced she is five months pregnant with her first child. Anna Kendrick, Olivia Palermo, Mia Moretti, Caitlin Moe, Audrey Quock, Garces and Diane Neal enjoyed the beats from the Misshapes, while indulging in treats from the on-site ice cream and pretzel trucks. PIERRE ANDRIEU/AFP/GETTY IMAGES Halle Berry and fiance, French actor Olivier Martinez, on Thursday at the ‘Toiles enchantées’ event in the Champs-Élysees film Festival. A BERRY WELCOME DAY AHEAD Halle Berry showed off her baby bump at the “Toiles enchantees” event as part of the Champs-Élysees Film Festival in Paris. COLEMAN-RAYNER Leyla Ghobadi’s (above) story about a Kanye affair got little traction Thursday as a Star magazine reporter canceled an interview. STAR’S ‘MISTRESS’ MISFIRE At Star magazine, they were running for the hills after the cover story on “Kanye’s mistress” imploded. The Star reporter who wrote the Leyla Ghobadi affair story was due to appear on “Access Hollywood” Thursday, but canceled the interview just 20 minutes before the taping. Confidenti@l reported yesterday that Ghobadi’s tale had little supporting evidence and that the Canadian spa worker was paid for the interview and did not undergo a lie-detector test. “The s— has hit the fan,” a source at the celebrity mag told Confidenti@l. EMMA’S ROLE KIND OF PEDESTRIAN “We’re the Millers” starlet Emma Roberts is actually walking the walk. Julia Roberts’ niece acted as a judge for the Vans Custom Culture competition at the Whitney Museum, where high schoolers designed their own pair of Vans. “I love cutting old jeans into shorts or studding my sneakers,” Roberts told us. Sneakers aside, Roberts says her favorite shoes are her Charlotte Olympia kitten flats. “I want them in every color!” PONDERING A ‘LUCKY’ BREAK Bennett Miller, director of “Capote” and “Moneyball,” says seeing hit Broadway show “Lucky Guy” made him question why he was working in film and not in journalism. Miller told Confidenti@l at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and Jaeger-LeCoultre dinner that the Nora Ephron play starring Tom Hanks is a must-see. The evening was co-hosted by Miller and Charles Finch, Paul Schrader and Rose Kuo. Also in attendance were Tory Burch, J.C Chandor, Danny Huston, Barry Levinson and Harvey Weinstein. JASON KEMPIN/GETTY IMAGES Singer Miley Cyrus is all decked out for the Myspace launch in L.A. MILEY IN A METAL MOOD Don’t get up in Miley Cyrus’ grill, okay? Cyrus, 20, showed up at the MySpace relaunch party in L.A. sporting an array of hardware above the shoulders. Amid Chanel necklaces and a safety-pin earring, Cyrus showed off a shiny grill on her bottom teeth. Good thing the bling ring got busted — they would have gone straight for Miley's mouth. SOFIA RIGHT UP MADISON’S AVENUE “The Bling Ring” director Sofia Coppola was caught off guard when a 10-year-old aspiring journalist handed her a business card at the Crystal & Lucy Awards in Beverly Hills. “I gave the card to Sofia and told her how I interview powerful women, and I want to interview her for my blog about influential women of Hollywood,” pint-sized scribe Madison Moellers explained to Confidenti@l at the Max Mara-sponsored event. Taken aback, Coppola said, “I will think about it and that’s so sweet.” Nice work kid. Send us your résumé. NO COMMON SCENTS HERE Socialite Annelise Peterson got a leg up on the competition and did her best Angelina Jolie at Wednesday’s Fragrance Foundation Awards by flashing one sexy thigh through a long black dress. “Photogs started chanting, ‘Angelina!’ ” according to one bystander. Alas, it was Taylor Swift who walked away with the Fragrance Celebrity of the Year award. Attendees also got a whiff of Dita von Teese, Carey Lowell, Connie Britton and Dana Carvey, who snapped photos of photographers and joked he was with the NSA.


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Arrested Development Season 4 Watch: Episode 15 - Blockheads

Arrested Development Season 4 Watch: Episode 15 - Blockheads

Netflix has released Season 4 of Arrested Development in its entirety, which means we'll be binge-watching the series' revival and sharing our reactions with you over the next couple of days. The recap below contains spoilers from Episode 15 - "Blockheads." Read no further if you haven't seen the episode yet! "Easily-breezily." Because I’m still decompressing the entirety of this mostly binge-watched fourth season of Arrested Development, its ending hasn’t yet left me feeling as if the comedic void in my life will never be filled. It isn’t entirely clear what I’m left with at all, due to the open-endedness of “Blockheads” along with plot gaps left that go seemingly intentionally unfilled. This season’s disjointed structure and limited episodic focus was a far more successful way to tell this Bluthian story than I could have imagined, but the finale left me a tad too unfulfilled, and it hinted at the larger story that I wanted to get back into. ”rso” It’s easy to speak highly of the episode as one out of fifteen rather than the finale, so that’s what I’ll do first. The overtly casual way that sexual offenders have played a collective role in this season (via G.O.B.’s Sudden Valley population solution) and they were featured more in this episode than any other, and George Michael’s complete naivety towards the intentions of his new neighbors nets the biggest laughs of the episode. I wonder how small a sheet of paper one would need to list all of G.O.B.’’s redeeming values, as he chooses to send his unwitting nephew into the lion’s den so that he might make Michael happy that another house in the neighborhood was sold. Someone should tell G.O.B. that success is only an illusion, when he doesn't have Mongol problems. (Will Arnett proves several times in this episode that he is a master of the distant gaze.) ”Enjoy your war pizza!” I’d really hoped P-Hound would be the new memorable character that this season gave us, but unintentionally getting on everyone’s bad side was his only character trait, and it wasn’t taken to the extremes that would have done his inclusion justice. He was just a cog in the machine that got George Michael out of his dorm and into a Sudden Valley house, though I did enjoy the multi-twin vote, and the implications that George Michael is a twincist. Perhaps finding out after all these years that his father wasn’t a twin led to this kind of behavior. "Although in fairness, this is something a Bluth brother would do." “Blockheads” mainly concerns itself with the escalating level of fibbery that Michael and George Michael are rapidly climbing, which we’ve seen before, only we see how heavily involved Rebel is this time. The final pre-tag moments after George Michael punches his father in the nose are stomach-churning. This is an act of affirmation that George Michael has earned after years of Michael’s selectively judgmental parenting, and years of hating his own name, and after a full season of getting hit in the face by people, Michael is finally struck by the person he’s most affected by. ”hit” However, I don’t think that the punch even spawned from their previous history. I think George Michael finally realized that becoming better at lying did nothing to help his situation in the long run, and it only led to him acting just like everyone else in his family. And when Michael further provoked that comparison by calling them twins once more, George Michael couldn’t handle it. I have to look at it that way, because while Rebel is a desirable woman, she is not important enough to drive such a solid stake between these characters whose relationship has been the series’ core strength. Especially when G.O.B.’s “deus ex medicina,” the Forget Me Now, is one of the factors that led to this confrontation. Still, it was good to get a moment of temporary closure from something. I don't feel the end of the Cinco de Cuatro festivities was made very clear, even if the aftereffects were. George Michael is goaded out of coming clean for his "keynote speech" for FakeBlock by a threatening note that George Michael takes as flirtation. It's signed by Anonymouse, which leads to a nifty little cameo by people wearing Guy Fawkes masks. (Were those guys really part of Anonymous? I couldn't tell, what with the masks.Ba dum chee.) To wrap everything else up, we learn Michael found out about George Michael and Rebel pre-festivities, and that he does indeed experience a series of slaps from Lucille 2 after making his sexual advances, and even after only referring to them. G.O.B. tells George Sr. he hired Mongols to build the fake wall, but has no money to pay them, so they're the ones who begin wrecking things. Lucille tells George Sr. that she wants a real divorce. Buster ends up getting big-handcuffed and arrested for Lucille 2's murder in an "Arraigned Development," and Lucille wants G.O.B. as president of the company. Ron Howard and Brian Grazer are more interested in getting the film done than ever. The sky, scheduling and network difficulties are the limit for this series' continuation. And before any closing remarks, it's worth pointing out again just how far this season has taken George Michael away from what we know and love about him. By the end of the episode, he is completely over Maeby - as per the narrator's choice of expression for George Michael and Rebel having sex - and after he fires her from the FaceBlock campaign that she'd put together, she ends up scheming on him, which leads to the final confrontation, where he punches his dad in the face. I mean, it's a good thing FakeBlock solidified his love for wood blocks and his internal clock's natural rhythm; otherwise, he might as well have been a complete stranger. The ending to this fourth season is by default as amazing as the rest, given its existence was highly unlikely, but it falls just short of amazing otherwise. I really enjoyed the obvious climax of Cinco de Cuatro being shown in chunks throughout the season rather than having one big brouhaha for the finale, but I do wish the finale had achieved a much broader scope in terms of tying up its storylines. But if this is all the Arrested Development that fans get until the end of time, it was well worth the wait, and it still will be after I finish watching it another fifteen times. And even though taking advice from G.O.B. and John Beard isn't always your best bet: "Love each other." See you next year, hopefully. The Rest Of The Developments bed It's a cheap gimmick, but each time George Michael got an extended pause before lying to whoever he was talking to, I was delighted. Imagine News. Why didn’t they say “Ninja, please,” more often? I'm guessing the promotional website allowing us to put Tobias in summer blockbusters was to also allow us to put Tobias in this fourth season, given how absent he is for most of it. It's here. It's a jeer. Now it's over here. Lem Depardieu. "Uncle G.O.B.?" "No, you're mistaken." The model homes are really just elaborate bottle openers, aren't they? Balone-ya. "It's like everyone's birthday!" I almost couldn't hear the dialogue in the shirts vs skins football game because I was laughing so hard. [I BRAKE FOR KIDS] - "Pervert." "Thank god we weren't on that plane." I wish I could have been there to hear Ron Howard get asked, “Do you mind if we call out Don Ameche in Cocoon and put it in your words for this episode?” "They don't come in anything less than a horde." Doublespeak with the titles here, as it makes the episode's first Peanuts reference and also plays on George Michael's interests in Fakeblock/Wood block. "Hey, how about her knowing they had a bike shop?" The deflating bounce house in the background after all of the sex offenders flee the pool is the image impressed upon me the most by this episode. bounce We hope you enjoyed this nearly miraculous season, as well as our thoughts on all the episodes. If you haven’t caught up with our recaps yet, you can do so here.


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News/ George Michael Hospitalized With Minor Injuries After Car Accident

s/  George Michael Hospitalized With Minor Injuries After Car Accident

George Michael had a bit of a fright but it looks like he's going to be OK. The 49-year-old entertainer suffered minor injuries in a car crash Thursday night on the crowded M1 motorway near St. Albans, Hertfordshire, England. A statement issued Friday by Michael's rep said the careless whisperer was a passenger in a Range Rover that was involved in a traffic accident and was hospitalized for "superficial cuts and bruises" but was "fine." NEWS: George Michael: "I'm incredibly lucky to be here" Video Thumbnail: Brinkley's First Swimwear Shoot in 30 Years Video Thumbnail: Heidi Klum Takes a Tumble Video Thumbnail: Tim McGraw Gets Candid About Past "No third party was involved," a spokesman for Michael said. "We have no further comment at this time." The BBC quoted an ambulance spokesman as saying a man in his '40s had suffered a head injury and had to be airlifted to a nearby hospital for further care. Sky News, on the other hand, reported that the person who was airlifted was another man riding in the vehicle. As the exact circumstances of the smashup are unclear, police are investigating. NEWS: Freedom! George Michael released early from prison The "Faith" singer is all too familiar with automotive mishaps, having spent a month in jail in 2010 for wrecking his car while under the influence of drugs and possessing cannabis. The following year, Michael nearly died after a life-threatening battle with pneumonia, but thankfully made a full recovery.



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