Yes. For all the talk that goes on that the Chandlers could not possibly have been lying, why do the media and the general public make such lame excuses for them not going to trial with this. Seriously, no parent making accusations like that would settle out of court for ANY amount of money. But most of the public gives the Chandlers a pass like they did the right thing. People should actually be just as upset with the Chandlers as they are/were with Michael for the settlement. And I just don't buy it that the Chandlers had no choice in not dealing with the case in criminal court, which they could have still done in spite of the settlement. Nothing would have stopped them from taking this to trial if they were really telling the truth, in my opinion.
Most people also don't know that instead of forcing this purely as a civil lawsuit, and not a criminal one the way Michael wanted, and instead of constantly trying to up the ante to force MJ into a settlement, immediately within days of the settlement:
They tried to sell a book. Ray Chandler admits to that in his subpoenas.
So they can't claim the publicity was too much for them and they wanted their privacy. Their immediate desire was to get MORE public attention by selling their son's supposed abuse in a book. They completely refused to take their son's abuser to criminal court.
Then in 1996 Evan sued MJ again for $60 million and a demand to be allowed to release an album where he wanted to sing and dance about his son's sexual abuse - so much for fearing publicity. This lawsuit is interesting as it's the only time Evan I believe was ever deposed. He wouldn't do it for his son's sexual abuse, but he would for more money.
So people can't claim the Chandler's were just doing the only thing they could for justice. Then once again in 2005 instead of testifying all of them besides June who'd been cut off from them, refused. Instead Ray's book was published, which was ghost written by Evan, and it was MJ who demanded Ray show up in court with all the documents and info he claimed he had, and Ray refused. He refused to testify about his nephew's supposed abuser in court, no, he was happy just to sell books about it. He then recently told Randall Sullivan that the Chandler's hoped the 2005 trial would bring them justice, no explanations or questions from the clueless Sullivan about why Ray and the Chandler's hadn't pursued justice - which is an interesting word Ray used, because it means the insurance settlement was not justice, though they claim in their book it pretty much was - at any point from 1993-2005 themselves.
Looking back over the comments:
"What about trust of your mother? Do you think any trust of your mother has been affected?"
"Well, not because she, as people would say, she wanted to pimp me out. More because of maybe, I tried to tell her one time and she didn't believe me."
"When was that? Do you remember?"
"No."
Okay, so Jordan claimed he tried to tell June and she didn't believe him, except she's never said this happened at all ever (which is why I imagine he said he couldn't remember when this was, he realized he couldn't just say a date only for June to get it wrong), but why hadn't Jordan tried telling Evan Chandler, the man who had been obsessed with MJ sexually abusing his son for about 2 months before his son confessed? He had one very eager to hear about this parent around him constantly begging for scraps of abuse stories, but instead Jordan claims he only once tried to tell his mother, who says she had no knowledge of any abuse. Why hadn't he volunteered easily to Evan even when he was begging to be told about this abuse later on in the dentist's chair, if with June he'd been the one willing to volunteer it? Why did Evan claim he had to force him to do it?
It's interesting, he never references his father at all in this conversation, does he? His father who'd rescued him from abuse, and who had been the one consumed by it, and there's no mention of what his father did for him here at all, or anything his father said or did.
Yes, bluetopaz, you are right about the bed sharing thing being something people get stuck on. But they don't realize that's how MJ grew up--all the boys sharing one room with 3 bunk beds and doubling up, so that MJ slept with Marlon, and that happened in the motel, hotel rooms too when they started out. This was a poor family in the beginning and many poor families just don't have a separate bedroom and/or a separate bed for each child.
I was reading Lady Gaga's crazy rant about her assistant in court, the assistant said Gaga made her sleep in the same bed with her because she hated being alone, actually two people have said that about Gaga, that she made them sleep with her. I'm not a fan of hers at all, but I thought it was interesting that other big celebrities who don't have any history of childhood abuse, or of having to sleep with your brothers growing up, had trouble sleeping alone too.
The thing with MJ is people have this idea that MJ would force children into his bedroom and his bed. That he spent hours and hours trying to get them to do it, tricking and luring them with every trick in the book. That the parents were somehow stripped of their rights and denied access to their kids and so didn't know about all this sinister stuff going on. The reality is that MJ and kids normally would just share rooms, not beds. Like Sean Lennon, Corey Feldman, Gotham Chopra, the Agajanian's, they all say MJ gave them a bed or took a cot, and that was it. Only a few kids fell asleep in his bed, and it was their choice, and with the consent and knowledge of the parents, almost all of which defend him about it.
The only ones who didn't was June/Evan, but Janet Arvizo even defended MJ about it repeatedly.
when did gavin say that? at the 2005 trial?
Yes.
Sneddon also asked Gavin towards the end if he'd ever had memory problems because of his cancer, Gavin said that when he had the cancer he had a few, but he was just fine now. I bet Sneddon was pissed Gavin had blown Sneddon's opening to give them an excuse for why their stories were such a mess.
And once again, proof that Sneddon was trying to manipulate the story into working better.