Sourcing a Michael Jackson Urban Legend

June 28, 2009 9:54 PM

Trying to figure out the story behing what I assume is a hoax/urban legend about Michael Jackson.

Either Friday or Saturday I heard on the radio (cannot remember which one since I assumed it was real at the time) in Los Angeles that the 13 year old boy who had settled out of court with Jackson in 1993 had come forward after his death and said he lied. He reportedly said his father made him lie to get the money and that he was coming forward now because he feels horrible now that Jackson has died.

I was expecting to see it all over the news, but heard nothing and after I was able to find nothing on google I figured it must be a hoax. However, I couldn't find anything on snopes about it either.

Does anyone know where this story came from? I don't know why it has stuck in my mind, but I'm really curious where it came from.

posted by whoaali to Society & Culture (9 answers total)

Best answer: It originated on a blog that had been created shortly after MJ's death (I can't find/remember the original URL), and was subsequently quoted verbatim by a bunch of different blogs.

Here's one of the blogs quoting the original story, and here's a refutation. The story is easily spotted as a fake with a tiny bit of critical thinking: it's written in extremely poor English, the author confuses Jordan (the kid) and Evan (his father) Chandler, and cites no sources for its broken-English "quotes".
posted by DecemberBoy at 10:04 PM on June 28, 2009

Response by poster: Yeah on retrospect I should have been a little more skeptical. Even though I didn't read it on a wordpress blog, it's still highly unlikely something like this would happen let alone a day after his death for a wide variety of reasons.
posted by whoaali at 10:10 PM on June 28, 2009

I dunno. He seems to have been surrounded by an aura of crazy.

Debbie Rowe now says that she never had sex with him, and their two kids were the result of artificial insemination with sperm from an anonymous donor.

That's right up there with the story you referred to.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 10:17 PM on June 28, 2009

Re: Debbie Rowe + AI

That last bit was kind of obvious really.
Barring genetic manipulation not currently available, or skin bleaching of the child-endangering kind, his children did not appear to be biologically his.

I was kind of surprised I never saw any commentary about it previously...?
posted by Elysum at 10:23 PM on June 28, 2009

Can't help with what you heard recently, but there's a detailed (and to me convincing) article - "Was Michael Jackson Framed? The Untold Story" - from the October 1994 issue of GQ that presents the evidence that the 1993 accusations were a shady hoax. It's worth reading in full if you care about the episode at all, noting 1) the boy only came up with the story after being given sodium Amytal, a drug that makes people very suggestible, by his dentist father, 2) the father was captured on tape planning some sort of set-up, and 3) the lawyer involved with the father was desperate for cash and up to his ears in sleaze.
posted by mediareport at 11:30 PM on June 28, 2009 [3 favorites]

The evidence that the 1993 accusations were a shady hoax

I read that article, though I don't have it now (who keeps magazines?). It was very interesting and plausible.

We all accept Jackson the Pedophile so easily, which is why the claims resonated... but Jackson the Gullible is even easier to imagine for me. Has there ever been a celebrity who seemed an easier target for scammers? The guy probably had a house full of Amway and Herbalife.
posted by rokusan at 1:27 AM on June 29, 2009 [1 favorite]

I was kind of surprised I never saw any commentary about it previously...?

Rowe is Australian, and I do recall many Australian trashy women's magazines making those exact allegations around the time the first child was born. I guess it just wasn't reported more widely than that, but yeah... does strike one as being really obvious.
posted by wingless_angel at 6:18 AM on June 29, 2009

Debbie Rowe now says ....

You know that link goes to News of the World, right? News of the World!
At any rate, it's been yanked.
posted by CunningLinguist at 6:38 AM on June 29, 2009

We all accept Jackson the Pedophile so easily, which is why the claims resonated... but Jackson the Gullible is even easier to imagine for me. Has there ever been a celebrity who seemed an easier target for scammers? The guy probably had a house full of Amway and Herbalife.

+1 always seemed that way

anyone see the picture of him in a hyperbaric chamber?
posted by knockoutking at 9:56 AM on June 29, 2009