Opposing images of Jackson as trial opens

SANTA MARIA, Calif. - As Michael Jackson's molestation trial opened Monday morning, District Attorney Tom Sneddon told jurors the pop star exposed a 13-year-old boy to "strange sexual behavior."

The prosecutor described sexually explicit details of two incidents involving the accuser in Jackson's bed. Sneddon said the accuser and his brother will describe both incidents on the stand.

"It's about how he traded on the boy's obvious and often expressed admiration," Sneddon told jurors.

The entertainer's defense opened its case Monday afternoon, focusing on the credibility of the accuser and his family. Jackson lead attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. told jurors that the accuser's mother had a history of concocting sexual assault charges and repeatedly soliciting celebrities for money, little of which has been accounted for.

“I’m here to tell you these charges are fictitious, they are bogus and they never happened,” Mesereau told the jury.

Mesereau said the mother went to comedian Jay Leno for money and Leno was so suspicious that he called Santa Barbara police to tell them he had been contacted and “something was wrong. They were looking for a mark.”

"Unfortunately for Michael Jackson," Mesereau noted, "he fell for it.”

Jurors must determine if Jackson gave wine to a young cancer patient at his Neverland Ranch, touched him inappropriately, kept his family from leaving and later pressured them into keeping quiet.

"The private world of Michael Jackson reveals that instead of cookies and instead of milk, you can substitute wine, vodka and bourbon," prosecutor Sneddon said.

The prosecution hopes to depict a poor family whose stricken son wanted to meet one of his idols. The child’s wish was granted, but the prosecution claims it turned into a nightmare of sexual abuse and imprisonment at Jackson’s home in the coastal mountains 170 miles north of Los Angeles.

P.R. disaster?
Shortly into its opening statement, prosecutors quoted "Living with Michael Jackson," a 2003 documentary by British journalist Martin Bashir, in which Jackson said sharing his bed with children was a "beautiful thing."

That broadcast, the prosecutor said, was a P.R. disaster for Jackson, one he tried desperately to minimize. He described how Jackson's associates allegedly pressured the accuser's family into cooperating with Jackson's version of events, part of a "desperate attempt" to save the star's career.

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Shortly after the documentary aired, Jackson first molested the boy, the prosecutor said. Sneddon said Jackson told the boy that masturbation was normal, then reached into the boy’s underpants and masturbated the boy and himself.

The second time, Sneddon said, Jackson tried to move the boy’s arm toward his own genitals and the boy resisted.

Sneddon also told jurors they would hear testimony from Neverland employees about children drinking there, including the accuser. One employee asked the accuser why he was intoxicated, Sneddon said, and was informed Jackson told the accuser he had to be a man and drink.

During the family's first visit to Neverland in 2000, the prosecutor alleged, Jackson showed sexually explicit Web sites to the boy, just 10 at the time, and his own son Prince Michael. When an image of a woman with bare breasts came on the screen, Sneddon said, Jackson turned to the group and said: “Got milk?”

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