- SANTA MARIA (Reuters)
-- Pop star Michael Jackson was charged on Thursday with nine counts of
child molestation against a boy under the age of 14, including seven "lewd
acts" allegedly committed earlier this year.
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- Jackson is also accused of giving the boy, who is not
identified in court papers, an "intoxicating agent" in order
to make it easier to molest him.
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- The self-declared "King of Pop," who was arrested
on suspicion of child molestation last month and released on $3 million
bail, was not present when the charges were unsealed at a courthouse in
Santa Maria, central California, near his Neverland Valley Ranch.
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- If found guilty, Jackson could face about 20 years in
prison. He would also be forced to register as a sex offender under California
law.
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- Jackson was due in court on Jan. 16 for a formal reading
of the charges. His attorney, Mark Geragos, was expected to speak to reporters
about the charges at a press conference later on Thursday.
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- Santa Barbara County District Attorney Tom Sneddon, who
has been portrayed in the press as Jackson's nemesis, announced the charges
at a press conference in which he denied media speculation that he delayed
filing the charges in order to buttress a weak case.
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- "I want to categorically say that is false,"
Sneddon said. "That was never, never, never the intent of our office."
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- Sneddon also dismissed a memo by a Los Angeles County
child welfare agency clearing Jackson of similar charges, saying that it
was based on a single interview and not expected to impact the Santa Barbara
case.
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- "To call that an investigation is a misnomer,"
Sneddon said. "It was an interview, plain and simple, and we are not
concerned about it."
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- JACKSON HEADED FOR ENGLAND
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- The 45-year-old entertainer was expected to be at Neverland
on Saturday night for a party with friends and family members who wanted
to lend him support, Jackson spokesman Stuart Backerman said.
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- Jackson then planned to travel to England for a vacation,
Backerman said. Jackson's lawyers arranged with prosecutors for the return
of his passport that was confiscated at the time of his arrest.
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- Jackson, who survived a similar brush with the law 10
years ago by making a multimillion dollar out-of-court settlement with
the family of a teenage boy, has protested his innocence.
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- He set up a Web site in November calling the current
allegations a "big lie," but he has remained out of the public
eye. His lawyers have accused the alleged victim and his family of trying
to make money out of Jackson.
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- Four weeks of media leaks and investigative reporting
have traced the latest allegations back to a British television documentary
broadcast in both Britain and the United States in February.
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- Jackson showed a British reporter around his Neverland
ranch, described himself as "Peter Pan" -- the boy who never
grew up -- and talked of having sleepovers with young boys.
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- Jackson insisted, however, that there was nothing sexual
in those encounters, which he viewed as an innocent form of his professed
affection for children.
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- Jackson's early career as a child star with the Jackson
5, and his rise to the moon-walking, slightly eccentric, superstar of his
1980s "Thriller" heyday has been eclipsed in recent years by
two short-lived marriages, the birth of three children by different mothers,
disastrous experiments with facial surgery and persistent questions over
his attachment to pre-pubescent children.
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- - Additional reporting by Dan Whitcomb and Jill Serjeant
in Los Angeles
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