Lawyer Claims Michael Jackson’s Employees Weren’t Responsible For Protecting Children From Abuse. In court yesterday (July 26), a lawyer for Michael Jackson’s estate claimed that employees of Jackson had no legal obligation to prevent the sexual abuse of children.
Two men, Wade Robson and James Safechuck, accuse the late artist of sexually abusing them when they were children. Their stories were brought to light in the 2019 HBO docuseries, Leaving Neverland. They sued Jackson’s estate, MJJ Productions Inc., and MJJ Ventures Inc., corporations owned by Jackson, in 2009 and 2013. They sued the two corporations for allegedly negligent hiring practices. Both lawsuits were previously dismissed in 2017, and again in 2021. Now, California’s 2nd District Court of Appeal is looking to re-examine the lawsuits.
Holly Boyer, who’s representing the two alleged victims, claims employees should feel obligated to protect children from abuse. This “would require low-level employees to confront their supervisor and call them pedophiles,” according to Jonathan Steinsapir, a lawyer for Jackson’s estate. “We do require that employees of the entity take those steps, because what we are talking about is the sexual abuse of children,” Boyer told judges.
Alleged Michael Jackson Victims Claim They Were Molested
“What we are talking about here is 7- and 10-year-old children,” she then adds. The attorney says the victims were “entirely ill-equipped to protect themselves from their mentor, Michael Jackson.” She also says that the plaintiffs, “were left alone in this lion’s den by the defendant’s employees. An affirmative duty to protect and to warn is correct.”
Steinsapir claims that the alleged victims’ parents “were not looking to Michael Jackson’s companies for protection from Michael Jackson.” He cited a deposition from one victim’s mother, noting that she didn’t know about the companies before bringing her son around Jackson. He additionally argues that negligence in the corporations’ hiring process is an unfair accusation, as the alleged abuser was in charge of hiring employees. “Any person that might be prone to criminal tendency has a duty not to hire himself?,” he asked.
