Portrait of Jackson's pill consumption emerges - CNN.com
More associates link Jackson to prescription drugs - CNN.com
LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Singer Michael Jackson took more than 10 Xanax pills a night, asking his employees to get the prescription medicine under their names and also personally traveling to doctors' offices in other states to obtain them, said a confidential document from 2004 that CNN obtained Thursday.
Los Angeles detectives are waiting on the coroner's report on the death of Michael Jackson.
The document from the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department contains confidential interviews conducted with two of Jackson's former security guards as officials prepared for Jackson's child molestation trial in 2005.
The singer was acquitted after the 14-week trial. But the information about the pills, and the lengths Jackson went to get them, adds to a growing mountain of claims tying the insomniac singer to drugs in recent days.
According to the drug's Web site, Xanax is for the treatment of panic disorder.
Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton said Thursday detectives have spoken to a number of doctors who have treated Jackson over the years, and are looking into the singer's prescription drug history.
Doctors who did not cooperate with investigators were issued subpoenas, a source told CNN Thursday. If needed, authorities will issue more, the source said.
Jackson died on June 25. Authorities are awaiting toxicology reports from the coroner's office to determine the exact cause of death.
"And based on those, we will have an idea of what it is we are dealing (with): are we dealing with a homicide or are we dealing with an accidental overdose?" Bratton said.
The speculation that prescription drugs, particularly sedatives, could have played a role in Jackson's death keeps coming up with each new nugget of information -- and there have been many.
The Jackson family knows that the probe into his death can turn into a criminal case, a source close to the family told CNN on Thursday.
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"The family is aware of a potential criminal prosecution," said the source, who did not want to be identified.
The amount of Xanax that Jackson alleged took surprised CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta.
In addiction cases, people develop a tolerance to drugs and have to take more and more pills, Gupta said.
"No matter how you cut it, this is an extremely high dosage of Xanax," Gupta said. "It is a huge red flag, even with the tolerance that I was talking about. This dosage is exceedingly high for any human being."
Jackson's attempt to battle sleep disorder
The 2004 document details a dark picture of Jackson's attempts to battle his sleeping disorder.
One security guard that sheriff's deputies interviewed said he expressed his concern about Jackson's use of 10-plus pills a night to another staffer.
The second staffer replied: "Jackson was doing better because he was down from 30 to 40 Xanax pills a night," according to the document.
One of the guards said he and three other employees would get prescriptions for Jackson under their names.
The second guard backed up the claim, saying he had picked up medicine for the singer that were in other people's names.
The document contains the names of five doctors -- some in California, some in New York and Florida. It was not immediately clear whether police have spoken to them as part of their investigation into Jackson's death.
After the doctor visits, Jackson would be "out of it and sedated," one guard said.
According to the sheriff's office document, the guard who provided the bulk of the information quit his job after Jackson "fell on his face" in a hotel room and hurt himself. The employee told Jackson he was not comfortable getting prescriptions for him and left, he later told investigators.
Years later in 2006, Jackson was in Las Vegas trying to jump-start his career. Deal maker Jack Wishna, who was helping the singer land a long-running show in Vegas, told CNN the singer would appear "drugged up" and "incoherent" -- often so weak and emaciated he had to use a wheelchair to get around.
The comeback shows were canceled because of Jackson's condition, Wishna said.
Around that time, sister Janet Jackson was so worried about Jackson that she tried to stage an intervention with assistance from her other brothers, two sources close to the Jackson family told CNN Wednesday.
Jackson reportedly ordered his security guards not to let the family members in. He also refused to take calls from his mother, Katherine, CNN has learned.
At the time, the Jackson family released a statement to People magazine denying the alleged intervention. But Janet Jackson was not among the signatories.
Along with the police investigation, which is being aided by the state attorney general's office and the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Los Angeles County coroner's office has also drawn up a list of Jackson's doctors and is trying to talk to them to determine what drugs they may have prescribed him.
Among them are Dr. Arnold Klein, Jackson's dermatologist, and Dr. Conrad Murray, his cardiologist.
Klein told CNN Wednesday that Jackson was addicted to drugs at one point but had kicked the habit.
Murray, who has been interviewed by police, has repeatedly said he will withhold comment until the coroner's tests are back.
Among others who have indicated that Jackson may have been using dangerous prescription medication are a nutritionist, Cherilyn Lee, who said Jackson pleaded for Diprivan despite being told of its harmful effects.
Sources close to Jackson told CNN that the insomniac singer traveled with an anesthesiologist who would "take him down" at night and "bring him back up" during a world tour in the mid-90s.
Another source involved with the probe told CNN that investigators found numerous bottles of prescription drugs in the singer's $100,000-a-month rented mansion in Holmby Hills.
The Associated Press and the Los Angeles Times, citing unnamed sources, said police found Diprivan.
Diprivan is a powerful sedative that is administered intravenously and is known by its generic name Propofol.
Bratton did not elaborate on what was discovered.
"At the time of the death with search warrants, we were able to seize a number of items from the residence where the death occurred and those will assist in the investigation," he said.
July 10, 2009
Portrait of Jackson's pill consumption emerges - CNN.com More associates link Jackson to prescription drugs - CNN.com
in the Sky
The Big Neverland in the Sky - The Daily Beastin the Sky
Today’s memorial service marked Michael Jackson’s final spectacle—as more of a product than a person.
Overstatement is the coin of the commercial realm and plenty has been spread around since the death of Michael Jackson. A perfect example was the memorial for the fallen entertainer today.
It is good and expected that each generation should have its own teenage heroes and do the best that it can with them until growing up and moving beyond the lightweight (but substantial weight) of its adolescence. It is obvious that Michael Jackson’s value to our contemporary world is the result of the technological repetition that has helped to protract adolescence into old age. Our history as the most important nation of the modern age has much to do with how well we have done holding back the dehumanization that comes with the technology that has had an ever more dominant position in our lives, from how and when we communicate to how, when, and where we store knowledge.
Michael Jackson became bigger as big business swelled forward, having discovered that the most lucrative market was young people who thought that they were the ones earning expendable income, not their parents.
Early on, we made a deal in which commercial fluff was rebutted by quality whenever it could be squeezed into programming schedules. Michael Jackson became bigger as big business swelled forward, having discovered that the most lucrative market was young people who thought that they were the ones earning expendable income, not their parents.
Soon kids had their asses kissed with such regularity that they began to believe that they actually had a worldview equal to, if not superior to, those held by their parents and other adults.
Michael Jackson was a good rhythm and blues singer, not a great one—if we compare his skills to those of Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and Al Green. No contest. He was a first-class rhythm and blues dancer, but was not even close to the level of dancing skill shown by Sammy Davis, Jr. Even less of a contest.
What he actually happened to be was mostly a product, a flesh and blood special effect only as human as needed to move units and thrill audiences.
As a special effect—a moving picture of a moving image—Jackson helped far too many of us become even more comfortable with counterfeit than we might have had we not had his example. But then we might have ended up in the same place had we only been led to perpetual adolescence by Prince and Madonna. Both made the most of fraudulence and whatever ultimately vulgar product they could produce.
Michael Jackson was not a vulgarian. He chose to have plastic surgeons make him look like Peter Pan and was a philanthropist along the lines that Pan might have been if he was an entertainer with millions to donate to good causes.
Jackson was—most importantly to many who judge all by commercial success—the most successful enertainer to come out of rhythm and blues, rock, and their derivatives. A hundred million units of Thriller should be enough to guarantee him ongoing fame, but his global fans have been programmed to overstate the value of their teenage taste and to live in terms of it. Someday they may all moonwalk with MJ in the great big Neverland in the sky. That would be cosmic justice, if nothing else.
Stanley Crouch's culture pieces have appeared in Harper's, The New York Times, Vogue, Downbeat, The New Yorker, and more. He has served as artistic consultant for jazz programming at Lincoln Center since 1987, and is a founder Jazz at Lincoln Center. In June 2006 his first major collection of jazz criticism, Considering Genius: Jazz Writings, was published. He is presently completing a book about the Barack Obama presidential campaign.
Michael Jackson's Afterlife Daily Beast
Celebrating the King of Pop’s many gifts is fair enough. Making him into a saint, not so much.
Today we witnessed the apotheosis of Michael Jackson.
To hear Berry Gordy tell it, Jackson was “the greatest entertainer that ever lived.” According to the seemingly ubiquitous Al Sharpton, Michael Jackson deserves as much or more credit than Martin Luther King for the success of black achievers from Tiger Woods to Barabbas, or Alabama.
Yes, this is a sad day but not because we are mourning the passage of the King of Pop. He’s been long gone, really. The real pity is that today’s spectacle demonstrates that a big segment of our society remains fully capable of deliberate blindness. That was obvious when Sharpton declared in defiant tones that there was “nothing wrong with Michael Jackson” and was answered by thunderous applause. Even Martin Luther King’s children helped with the ritual, as his daughter edged “accusations” against him into “persecutions.”
Even Martin Luther King’s children helped with the ritual, as his daughter edged “accusations” against him into “persecutions.”
Celebrating Jackson’s gifts is fair enough. Making him into a saint, not so much. If romance is the willing suspension of disbelief, turning Michael Jackson into a deity is a willing suspension of belief in what we know to be true. And as a country, we can’t afford to live in Netherlands any more.
Despite Sharp assertion that nothing was wrong with Jackson, everything about him had become a mess: his physical and mental condition, his finances, his medical records, and now his estate. The music and the dancing were unforgettable but what I can’t forget is the appalling degree to which Jackson was both victim and victimized.
When the old photos of that wide-eyed little boy were on the monitor, it reminded me that Jackson was another abused child star whose torment became manifest in every imaginable way. When Berry Gordy said that Jackson, as a 10-year-old, sang with “the sadness and passion of a man who had been living the blues and heartbreak his whole life,” it struck me that very possibly the 10-year-old Jackson had done exactly that.
And what about the other little boys? If Jackson dodged the bullet on child-molestation charges, does he seem like an innocent man? Who hands over a settlement worth more than $20 million if there was no crime? Something indeed was wrong with Michael Jackson. He stood repeatedly accused of a crime so heinous that most people would not want anyone facing those allegations living on their block. Unless, of course, that individual was a celebrity.
As St. Michael rose into the clouds this afternoon, other reality-based thoughts persistently intruded into my reality-addicted mind. At this time of crisis on many fronts, I couldn’t help thinking about the media’s prolonged prostitution of itself to this event. At a time of financial ruin, the city of Los Angeles has been asking citizens to donate money to help pay for the management of this spectacle.
As we have already learned, Jackson’s death may produce more profit than the improbable comeback tour that those around Jackson persisted in believing was possible for the frail, skeletal individual who they supposedly so loved. No doubt Jackson will be as ruthlessly exploited in death as he was in life.
And there was one big bonus winner at the Jackson service. Can you guess? When Magic Johnson described his delight at learning that Jackson loved Kentucky Fried Chicken, it’s easy to imagine that there was celebrating at the Colonel’s headquarters. A double celebrity endorsement, seemingly a spontaneous gift from the celebrity gods! I can’t imagine that the KC people—still getting over that little dustpan over the Oprah giveaway—aren’t even now figuring out how to make the most of that.
Kim Masters covers the entertainment business for The Daily Beast. She is also the host o
Is Michael in Heaven? - The Daily Beast
Michael Jackson was raised by Jehovah’s Witnesses and flirted with Scientology and Islam. Now many Christian groups wonder if the King of Pop is residing with the King of Kings.
In the days since Michael Jackson’s death, much has been made of his ability to build bridges. His popularity spread across cultures and demographics. Jackson’s religion—at least what we know of it—followed suit.
His parents raised him in the Jehovah’s Witness tradition, a semi-Christian sect. He was briefly married to Lisa Marie Presley, a Scientologist, and though he reportedly did some fundraising for Scientology, it’s not clear whether he ever converted to the faith. He claimed Rabbi Schmuley Boteach as a good friend, and it was the rabbi who convinced Jackson in 2000 to write a captivating essay in Beliefnet about his love of the Sabbath. Finally, in 2008, Jackson reportedly converted to Islam and began spending much of his time in Bahrain.
Should a child die before reaching the mature state, salvation is theirs. What if Jackson never reached that age of accountability?
But in the days after his death, rumors began to surface that he had become a Christian due to the influence of Gospel singers Andráe and Sandra Crouch, who are co-pastors at New Christ Memorial Church of God in Christ in San Fernando, California. Naturally, this thrilled his Christian fans—witness the thousands of comments on the Facebook page where the rumor began. The Crouches eventually debunked the conversion story, but indicated that Jackson was interested in Jesus and the Holy Spirit, and prayed with them.
Clearly, Jackson held an abiding interest in spiritual things, and there was no shortage of “moonwalking in heaven” video tributes following his death. But many of his fans want an answer to the ultimate question: Where is he now? Is Michael Jackson in heaven?
On blogs on Web sites like Christianity Today, a debate is raging in earnest about whether Jackson has made it to the kingdom of heaven. “The couple of times I saw Michael Jackson I could not surpass his genuineness and remember always feeling bad because of all the people who ridiculed him,” says one commenter, noting, “if we deeply think about it, this is exactly what people did to Jesus and Jesus helped people just as Michael did by giving to over 30 charities.” Others point to interviews Jackson gave in which he invoked the Lord’s name. “If you’re in doubt, do some research especially on his interviews with Oprah and Geraldo. He clearly indicated his faith in Christ,” urges another Jackson fan.
But still others find the very idea of Jackson residing with God repellent. “Praying a prayer and accepting Jesus ‘in our hearts.’ That is Americanized Evangelical Christianity at its worst,” writes one about what they see as Jackson’s half-hearted religiosity. “Obviously, this was all for money reasons and to play in Satan's ball field,” insists another of Jackson’s affiliation with the Crouches. “Any heaven Michael heads to is a thinly disguised hell,” asserts a third.
Most Christian pastors and scholars hesitate to give an authoritative answer. “It’s not up to me,” says Rev. Mandy Sloan Flemming, a minister at St. Mark United Methodist Church in Atlanta. “I do not know the heart, mind, or spirit of Michael Jackson, nor do I know which way the wind blows. Only God can know.” Others think it’s the wrong question altogether. “Biblically, I think that those who follow Jesus are actually prohibited from definitively attempting to answer it,” says Adam Ellis, teaching pastor at North August Church of Christ in North Augusta, South Carolina.
That said, “Michael Jackson seemed to be a very troubled man, and that’s just the kind of person God has a history of taking pity on,” says Tony Jones, a theologian, blogger, and author of The New Christians. But like the others, Jones is careful to add, “I’d look askance at any religious leader who would answer that with any degree of certainty,”
God’s pity aside, Jackson exhibited behavior one doesn’t expect from the heaven-bound, from his alleged drug addictions to his accused pedophilia. Still, those don’t automatically exclude him from paradise, says Chris Seay, the pastor of Ecclesia Houston and president of Ecclesia Bible Society. “We shouldn’t be surprised to find someone like Jackson in heaven,” he says, calling attention to biblical passages like Matthew 7:21-23. “Jesus makes it most clear that we will all be surprised to see that the beautiful and upstanding people we thought were ‘locks’ for heaven did not make it in, and the people we thought hell was created for might have the largest palace on our golden street.”
Jackson’s apparent thirst for spiritual enlightenment is one thing working in his favor, says Rev. Paul Leon Ramsey, pastor of Mayflower Congregational Church in Englewood, Colorado. “If God is a loving parent and a benevolent creator, I can’t really see God giving eternal damnation to anyone who desired to be one with God.” And wherever he is, Ramsey says, Jackson can still choose God even now. “I don’t believe that God is confined by the same [temporal] boundaries we are. Death is not the end for God, and because God desires eternal union with us, death is not the end for us. Death is not even the end for Michael Jackson.”
Jason Poling, the pastor at New Hope Community Church in Pikesville, Maryland, brings up a unique scenario related to Jackson’s mental and emotional state. Many conservative evangelicals, trusting in the mercy of God, believe all children are automatically heaven-bound until they reach the “age of accountability”—an undefined point at which they become responsible for their own choices and morality. Should they die before reaching that mature state, salvation is theirs. What if, Poling asks, Jackson never reached the age of accountability? Jackson was only 8 years old when he began touring with the Jackson 5. From that point on, he lived an increasingly insulated life, one that seemed to strand him in a state of arrested development. “The only reason I might hope that Jackson has been accepted into God’s presence has to do with the fact that, in many ways, his life was one of perpetual, and increasingly bizarre, childhood,” he says. “If God somehow receives children before an age of accountability, it may be that he has received one of a very advanced chronological age. But I doubt it.”
Other pastors are equally doubtful. After making the usual caveat (“I did not see his heart and I am not God”), Josh King says Jackson’s public persona didn’t give him much hope of a heavenly destination. “As tragic and hurtful as it is,” he says, “Michael seemed to bear no fruit or actions that would suggest that he had a personal relationship with Christ Jesus.” King, the associate pastor to millennials at First Baptist Church in Mansfield, Texas, says the accusations and oddities of Jackson’s life aren’t the issue—the things missing from his life are the issue. “It seemed as though he had no accountability with other believers. He did not share in community with other Christ followers. He did not appear to share the message and hope of Christ with those around him.” God blessed Jackson with an undeniable platform and talent, King says, but the star failed to use those things to honor God, wasting them in pursuit of wealth, fame, and acceptance.
Derek Jacks, student pastor at Birmingham’s Rocky Ridge Church, suggests Tuesday’s memorial service also lacked evidence of Jackson’s faith. “If we take the memorial service seriously, all those there praised Michael for who he was. No one praised God for how he had worked in Michael’s life,” Jacks says. "[There was] no mention of Michael's good deeds as a response to God's grace...Michael was praised for doing all he did on his own."
Regardless of Jackson’s eternal destination, his life and death ought to lead us to introspection, says Jason Salamun, pastor at Project Church in Rapid City, South Dakota. “The death of Michael Jackson, and the recent slew of celebrity deaths, has reminded me that the end of this life ends with a comma, not a period, and to live like today’s my last day here on earth.”
Is Michael Jackson in heaven? We don’t know, and to speculate about it makes pastors uncomfortable. What we do know is that Jackson’s spiritual pedigree—like his life—seemed extremely complex. No one disputes that Michael Jackson was lost, and that he spent his life searching. The hope is that, somehow, he got found.
Jason Boyett is the author of the upcoming books Pocket Guide to the Afterlife, Pocket Guide to the Bible, and Pocket Guide to Sainthood, releasing in August from Jossey-Bass. He blogs about religion and culture at jasonboyett.com.