SANTA MARIA, Calif. — The judge in Michael Jackson’s child molestation trial ruled Monday that the prosecution may present testimony about past allegations against the pop star involving five boys, including two who reached multimillion-dollar civil settlements with the singer.
Superior Court Judge Rodney Melville ruled after hearing arguments by District Attorney Tom Sneddon and vigorous opposition by defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr.
The judge said he would allow testimony about alleged sexual offenses and an alleged pattern of “grooming,” or preparing the boys for molestation.
The prosecution had sought to introduce testimony about seven boys, but the judge declined to allow evidence about two.
The judge said he would allow testimony by a 1990 accuser who received a $2.4 million settlement from Jackson and testimony by that boy’s mother.
A boy who reached a multimillion-dollar settlement from Jackson in 1993 will not testify. Other testimony will be allowed from people who allegedly have knowledge of the case.
The judge said the jury can be told that Jackson reached settlements with the 1990 and 1993 accusers but may not be told the amounts, unless the defense brings them up.
It was unclear exactly what Jackson was accused of doing with each of the five boys, although the 1993 accuser did claim repeated molestation, and Sneddon said in court Monday that the boy in the 1990 case was touched twice over his clothes and once under his clothes.
Jackson’s lawyer fought the admission of evidence about so-called past similar acts, saying it was based on third parties, many of whom were after Jackson’s money.
“How can you just allow a parade of third-party characters to come in without any victims?” Mesereau asked during arguments.
Sneddon, seeking to use past allegations to buttress the credibility of Jackson’s current accuser, said the testimony of other witnesses will show that Jackson has a consistent pattern of abuse.
The prosecutor told the judge that Jackson was observed inappropriately touching four children. The alleged touching included kissing, hugging and inserting his hand into children’s pants, he said.
“All of these children are basically within the ages of 10 and 13” at the time of the alleged offenses, Sneddon said.
The district attorney also said that testimony would include Jackson being seen in bed with four children while the underwear of the children and Jackson was at the side of the bed.
In his arguments, Sneddon noted that in the defense opening statement Mesereau listed gifts Jackson purchased for the current accuser’s mother. Sneddon said Jackson has a pattern of buying gifts for the mothers of boys to keep them preoccupied.
Mesereau told the judge that the defense would put on a “mini trial” on each allegation that was allowed in. He had urged the judge to consider the evidence that has been presented so far on the current charges against Jackson.
“You have to consider what the case looks like,” he said. “It looks real bad and it’s going to get worse. You can’t stop the defense from putting on a full-blown defense and I mean just that.”
Mesereau said that among the alleged victims that the prosecutoin would bring in by reference would be Macaulay Culkin, who he said has always denied that anything improper happened to him while with Jackson.
“There’s Macaulay Culkin who has repeatedly said he was never molested,” Mesereau said.
He referred to some of Sneddon’s third-party witnesses as “the gang.” The reference was to former Jackson employees who sued the singer in the past and lost, and were then ordered to pay the singer $1 million in damages.
Mesereau also said it would be unfair to have others testify about the 1993 case without putting that accuser on the stand. Mesereau asserted that the 1993 accuser’s father and stepfather filed numerous lawsuits against Jackson to get money from him.
In his current trial, Jackson, 46, is accused of a then-13-year-old boy at Neverland in February or March 2003, giving him alcohol and conspiring to hold the boy’s family captive to get them to make a video rebutting a documentary in which Jackson said he let children sleep in his bed. The singer said it was non-sexual.
The ruling came a day after Jackson declared his innocence in an interview with the Rev. Jesse Jackson and said he considers himself the latest of several “black luminaries” to be unjustly accused, citing former South African President Nelson Mandela and former boxing champions Muhammad Ali and Jack Johnson as others.
In the interview broadcast on radio stations and the Internet, Jackson also asked fans to pray for him, said he was currently in “the lowest point emotionally” of his life.