LOS ANGELES: Almost four years after his shocking death, the bizarre life and sorry demise of Michael Jackson will play out again in a $40bn civil trial that pits the singer’s family against the organisers of a musical comeback that never happened.
Opening statements are set for today in what is expected to be an emotional, three-month long jury trial that seeks to hold AEG Live, the promoters of the never-realised series of 2009 London concerts, liable for the wrongful death of the “Thriller” singer.
The lawsuit, brought by Jackson’s elderly mother Katherine on behalf of the singer’s three children, alleges that privately-held AEG Live was negligent in hiring the physician convicted in 2011 of his involuntary manslaughter to care for the singer while he rehearsed for the series of 50 shows.
Jackson, 50, drowning in debt and seeking to rebuild a reputation damaged by his 2005 trial and acquittal on child molestation charges, died in Los Angeles of an overdose of the powerful surgical anesthetic propofol and a cocktail of other sedatives in June 2009. His personal physician, Dr Conrad Murray, is serving a four-year prison sentence.
REUTERS
