LOS ANGELES, Jan 20 (AFP) - Michael Jackson's trial judge has given him permission to make a televised statement refuting damaging leaks of secret testimony given by his child molestation accuser, Fox News said Thursday.
Jackson has taped a statement and an interview with Fox News reporter Geraldo Rivera that could be broadcast sometime ahead of the scheduled start of jury selection in his child sex case on January 31, a spokeswoman said.
But Fox said it had yet to make a final decision as to whether the explosive rebuttal -- which will allow Jackson to speak out on the accusations despite a strict gag order in the case -- will be broadcast.
Neither Judge Rodney Melville's office nor Jackson's lawyers could be reached to confirm that Jackson had been given the green light to hit back at leaks from his teenager accuser's testimony to a grand jury that led to Jackson's indictment.
The American ABC television network's "Primetime Live" programme last week broadcast key excerpts from the transcripts of the testimony of the now 15-year-old boy and his younger brother presented to the panel last March.
The teenager told in graphic detail how the star allegedly fondled him intimately on several occasions and plied him with alcohol, while his brother said the pop icon had walked around naked and aroused in front of the children at his Neverland ranch.
"We were laying on the bed and he (Jackson) told me that men have to masturbate -- he told me that he wanted to teach me (to masturbate)," the alleged victim told the grand jurors, according to ABC.
"So we were laying in the bed, and then he started rubbing me -- he put his hand down my pants and he started rubbing me -- my private area -- he was masturbating me," according to the extracts from the court transcripts.
The boy however told the prosecutor that he had not intimately touched Jackson during their sexual encounters.
The details were the first to emerge of the alleged molestation of the boy, a recovering cancer patient, who claims that Jackson abused him at Neverland in February and March of 2003.
The extracts were drawn 1,900 pages of transcripts of testimony from 41 witnesses who appeared before the panel of laymen that handed down a 10-count indictment against the "King of Pop."
Jackson's lawyer issued a statement strongly denouncing the leaking of the testimony that was placed under seal by Melville.
"This case will be won in the courtroom and not through 'leaks' in the media," Thomas Mesereau said. "When he has his day in court, Michael Jackson will be acquitted and vindicated," he said.
Jackson, 46, has pleaded innocent to 10 charges, including child molestation, plying the boy with alcohol to seduce him and conspiring to kidnap the youngster and keep him and his family prisoners at Neverland.
He was arrested on November 20, 2003, and remains free on three million dollars' bail pending the scheduled start of his trial in the California town of Santa Maria, near Neverland, on January 31.
01/20/2005 19:36 GMT - AFP