SANTA MARIA, California - The defence in Michael Jackson`s child-sex trial gets its chance Friday to cross-examine his alleged victim`s sister, after she offered damaging testimony on her family`s stay at the star`s Neverland Ranch.
Legal experts say the 18-year-old witness, who came across as rather childlike when testifying on Thursday, could pose something of a test for the defence team, and in particular Jackson`s physically imposing lead lawyer, Thomas Mesereau.
"There is a naive quality about her that might attract the jury`s sympathy," said legal analyst Anne Bremner, a criminal defence attorney.
"If the jurors get the impression the defence is bullying her, it could be a problem," Bremner said.
The sister`s testimony on Thursday focused on a period two years ago when prosecutors allege Jackson conspired to intimidate and isolate her family, held them captive at his ranch and sexually molested her then 13-year-old brother.
"We were scared. It was very aggressive," she said of the stay at Jackson`s sprawling, fantasy-style home.
Speaking in a barely audible monotone, she laid out an often confusing sequence of events that involved her family being whisked to and from Miami in a private plane, cajoled into making a video defending Jackson`s reputation and applying for passports and visas to take them to Brazil.
The ordeal, as described in her testimony, was sparked by the negative fallout of British journalist Martin Bashir`s documentary, "Living With Michael Jackson," which showed the superstar holding hands with his future accuser and admitting to sharing his bed with children.
Prosecutor`s allege that the film threw Jackson and his aides into a panic, and that they conspired to abduct the family to keep them away from the media.
The sister told jurors that the family was flown to a luxury resort in Florida ahead of the US broadcast of the documentary on February 6, 2003.
"Michael Jackson wanted for us not to watch it, the Bashir tape. He was kind of like upset about it. He didn`t want to see it," she said.
The family was then flown back to Neverland in California on Jackson`s private plane, she said, adding that during the flight she saw the singer and her brother drinking from a shared Diet Coke can.
The prosecution alleges that the can actually contained wine.
Once back at the ranch, she described a mood of fear and intimidation that caused the family to finally pack their things and leave after a week.
"My mom wanted to get us out of there," she said.
When asked by prosecutor Thomas Sneddon why she had been scared, the young woman said: "The whole secrecy ... very aggressive, I didn`t understand what was going on."
She added without elaborating: "There was one point when (a Jackson aide) said there were death threats."
During that time at Neverland, the sister said she came across Jackson giving her brother, a recovering cancer victim, alcohol in a wine cellar that was accessed from the ranch`s amusement arcade through a door disguised as a juke-box.
"I saw Mr Jackson pouring wine into cups," she told jurors, adding that the self-proclaimed `King of Pop" then handed the wine to four children present -- her brother, their younger brother, then 11, another boy and herself.
"It tasted funny and weird," she said.
On another occasion, she recounted following her brothers into Jackson`s bedroom, where the singer lay down on his enormous bed with the two boys as they watched a movie.
There were "empty bottles, or half-full bottles of alcohol" ranged around the room, she added.
Among the charges levelled against Jackson are several of plying his alleged victim with alcohol in order to facilitate the alleged molestation.
If convicted of all 10 charges he faces, Jackson could go to prison for up to 20 years.
03/04/2005 09:06 GMT