Joseph Naso

Joseph Naso is an American serial killer, sentenced to death for the murder of six women. Biography: Joseph Naso was born on January 7, 1934 in Rochester, New York. After serving in the U.S. Air Force in the 1950s, he met his first wife Judith. Their marriage lasted for 18 years, but after the divorce Naso continued visiting his ex-wife who lived in the Bay Area. The couple had a son named Charles who later developed schizophrenia, and Naso spent his later years caring for him. Naso took classes in various San Francisco colleges in the 1970s and lived in the Mission District of San Francisco and then in Piedmont, California in the 1980s. He lived in Sacramento between 1999 and 2003, and finally settled in Reno, Nevada in 2004, where he was arrested in 2011. He worked as a freelance photographer and had a long history of petty crimes such as shoplifting, which he committed even in his mid-seventies. His acquaintances nicknamed him "Crazy Joe" for his behavior. Victims: -Roxenne Roggasch was found dead on January 10, 1977, dumped near Fairfax, California. She was 18 years old and stood 5'2". She had been strangled. Police estimated she was killed less than a day before. Police suspected that Roggasch had worked as a sex worker, but her family denied this. -Carmen Lorraine Colon, 22, was found on August 13, 1978, along Carquinez Scenic Highway, a road between Crockett and Port Costa, just thirty miles from the body of the first victim. A Highway Patrol officer investigating reports of a cattle shooting found a decomposing nude body that had been dumped. The body was later identified as Colon's. -The body of Shariea Lefern Johnson Patton, 56, washed ashore near the Naval Net Depot in Tiburon, California in 1981. At the time of her death, she was a resident of the Bay Area looking for a job. Naso managed the residence where the woman used to live. He also took a photo of the victim. He was considered the prime suspect by police in 1981, but gave the investigators only elusive answers and was not charged for the next thirty years. -Sarah Dylan, a Bob Dylan groupie (born Renee Shapiro, she later changed her name to that of the idol's former wife), was last seen on her way to a Dylan concert at the Warfield theater in San Francisco in May 1992. She was killed in or near Nevada County, California. In 1993, the body of Pamela Ruth Parsons, a waitress, was found in Yuba County, California. She was 38. Parsons worked near Cooper Avenue in Yuba City, where Naso lived at that time. -Tracy Lynn McKinney Tafoya was found dead in 1994, also in Yuba County. She was 31. The killer drugged, raped and strangled her, and left the body near Marysville Cemetery. It has been estimated that a week passed before the body was found. Arrest, trial and conviction: Nevada parole and probation authorities arrested Naso in April 2010. During a search of his home, authorities discovered a handwritten diary in which Naso listed ten unnamed women with geographical locations. On April 11, 2011, he was charged with the murders of Roggasch, Colon, Parsons and Tafoya. All four victims were listed by the police as sex workers. The other six women mentioned in the diary remained unidentified. Later, prosecutors Dori Ahana and Rosemary Sloat introduced evidence identifying Patton and Dylan. On August 20, 2013, Naso was convicted by a Marin County jury of the murders. On November 22, 2013, a Marin County judge sentenced him to death for the murders. Naso was also a person of interest in the Rochester Alphabet murders of 1971–73 case, since four of his victims bore double initials, just as the Rochester murder victims, and Naso had lived there for a long time. Naso, however, was ruled out of that case when DNA found on Californian victims was not matched to the DNA found on a Rochester victim's body.

Charles Jackson (serial killer)

Charles Jackson, Jr., known as The East Bay Slayer, was an American serial killer, responsible for the murders of at least 7 women and one man between 1975 and 1982. All crimes were committed in Contra Costa County, in the San Francisco Bay Area. His exposure occurred only a few years after his death, based on results from DNA profiling. Jackson is suspected of committing several more murders during the 1970s and 1980s around the Contra Costa area, in which at least 5 other serial killers also operated in that time frame. Early years: Charles Jackson, Jr. was born on February 12, 1937 in Louisiana. Shortly after birth, his family moved to Mississippi, where young Charles grew up in the countryside. He lived in a socially disadvantageous environment, as his father was an alcoholic who was aggressive towards him and other family members. Due to material difficulties, Jackson dropped out of high school in the early 1950s and started spending a lot of time on the street. He became involved with the criminal subcultures, and soon delved into crime himself. Criminal career: In 1953, at the age of 16, Jackson was first arrested and charged with theft. Subsequently, over the next 28 years, he was repeatedly arrested on charges of committing crimes such as burglary, rape, assault and molestation of minors (dates include March 2, 1962; January 11, 1965; May 15, 1967; October 1969; June 9, 1970; August 21, 1975 and May 22, 1978). The last time he was released was on September 12, 1981, after which he started work as a day laborer for some time, as well as doing other odd jobs. On January 2, 1982, Charles attacked Joan Stewart, raping, strangling and stabbing her several times in the woodlands near Montclair. During the investigation, several eyewitnesses to the crime were found who wrote down the license plate on Jackson's car, on the basis of which he was arrested on three days later, and charged with Stewart's murder. In 1983, he was found guilty and received a sentence of life imprisonment as punishment. Implication in other killings: Charles Jackson spent the rest of his life in the Folsom State Prison, where he died in February 2002 from a heart attack. A month after his death, DNA testing of biological samples from him were carried out on samples found on the bodies of various women and girls, killed throughout Contra Costa County during the 1970s and 1980s. In 2005, based on results from the DNA research, Jackson's involvement was revealed in the following murders: Sonya Higginbotham (19), killed in June 1975 in Auckland; Ann Johnson (27), killed in August of that same year in Montclair; Cynthia Waxman (11), killed on April 22, 1978 in Moraga; Henry Villa (62) and his wife Edith (59), killed on November 22, 1981 in Albany Hill; Betty Grantzweig (37), killed on December 4, 1982 in Auckland; and finally, Gail Slokam (34), killed on December 8th of that year, also in Auckland. All of the women had been raped and strangled. Jackson's true victim count is currently unknown, since there were at least five other serial killers in the Contra Costa area during his murder spree.

Jan Broberg Felt

Jan Broberg Felt (née Broberg) is an American actress, singer and dancer. She is known for having been kidnapped twice, at ages twelve and fourteen. The experience has been documented in her mother Mary Ann Broberg's book, Stolen Innocence: The Jan Broberg Story, and the documentary Abducted in Plain Sight. Early life: Jan Broberg was born on July 31, 1962 in Pocatello, Idaho to Robert "Bob" and Mary Ann Broberg. Jan was the couple's first child, and she was followed by two younger sisters, Karen and Susan. The Brobergs were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Bob Broberg worked as a florist. Mary Ann was a housewife. Career: Jan has appeared in over a dozen feature films. Some of her film credits are Slaughter of the Innocents (HBO), Poof Point (Disney), Message in a Cell Phone (Disney), The Secret Keeper (Columbia TriStar), Bug Off, Hope For Troubled Teens, Nadir, Family First, Little Secrets (Columbia TriStar), Mobsters and Mormons, and The Book of Mormon Movie, Vol. 1: The Journey. She also played the mother of the main character in Baptists at Our Barbecue, and co-starred with Elijah Wood in Maniac. Jan has appeared in many television series, including: Touched by an Angel (CBS), Promised Land (CBS), Remember Me (PBS), Death Row (PBS), The Man With Three Wives (the Norman Grayson story), Harmful Intent (NBC), Siege at Marion (NBC), Deliver Them from Evil: The Taking of Alta View (CBS), Ancient Secrets of the Bible (CBS Miniseries). Perhaps her most notable role was in the WB series Everwood as Nurse Louise. Jan is a veteran stage actress and has had starring roles in the following: The Sound of Music (Tuacahn Theatre), I Do! I Do! (Sundance Theatre), Jane Eyre (Glendale Center), My Fair Lady (Scera Theatre), Carousel (Idaho State University), Trixie True Teen Detective (BYU), and No No Nanette (Playmill). Personal life: Broberg was kidnapped when she was twelve, and again when she was fourteen, both times by the same perpetrator who was a family friend. She and her mother wrote a book titled Stolen Innocence: The Jan Broberg Story about the experience. Broberg's story was the feature of the true crime documentary Abducted in Plain Sight. Filmed and produced over a three-year period, it was released in January 2019. Broberg is married to Larry Felt. She has a son from a previous marriage. She was given a "Woman of Achievement Award" by the St. George Chamber of Commerce in 2008.

Marvin L. Maple

Marvin Leroy Maple was an American grandfather arrested at age 73 for kidnapping two of his grandchildren more than 20 years earlier. After losing a custody dispute with the children's natural parents in 1989, Maple and his wife moved from their home in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, taking their 7-year-old grandson and 8-year-old granddaughter with them. They all changed their names and started a new life together in San Jose, California. The grandparents eventually put the two children through college. By the time authorities located Maple in 2009, the grandson was 27 years old. The granddaughter was 28 years old and still living with her grandfather. At that point, neither of the children, then adults, wanted to reconnect with their natural parents. The grandmother had died two years earlier. Maple was extradited to face charges in Tennessee, where he was placed on four years' probation. He died in 2016 at age 80. Family history: Maples had three children, all girls. His eldest daughter Debbie married Mark Baskin, a Southern Baptist, who was studying to be a minister. They had three children, Christi, Bobby, and Michael. In 1987, the grandparents offered to take care of the two older children, until the parents and youngest child got settled in Louisville, Kentucky, where Mark would attend the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Accusations of abuse: Several months later, when the Baskins wanted to resume care of their children, the grandparents objected, accusing the Baskins of abusing them. Authorities started an investigation, and the Maples were awarded temporary custody of the two children on May 5, 1988. Karen Hornsby was appointed as attorney ad litem to represent the children during the investigation. However, the authorities found no evidence of abuse during their investigation, and the parents were expected to regain custody of their children. Gone: While the matter was still in litigation, the Maples quietly sold their house and left town with their grandchildren. A final hearing was scheduled March 29, 1989; however, when Hornsby went to check on the children on March 10, she found the home up for sale, and the family gone. An arrest warrant was issued, and sheriff's detectives and private investigators searched for 20 years, checking records, questioning family members, and requesting help from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. Search: The missing family was the subject of episode 47 of Unsolved Mysteries on February 7, 1990. A San Diego newspaper published a story about the missing family in January 2009, after being contacted by Tennessee cold case detective Bill Sharp, who began working on the case a year earlier. Because of numerous earlier sightings in California, investigators had long suspected the family was still in California. Discovered: The whereabouts of the Maples and their grandchildren remained a mystery until February 2009, when they were discovered alive and well in San Jose. Breaking the Silence: In May 2017, after eight years of silence following being found, the grandson, now only answering to Jon Bunting, publicly spoke out in defense of his grandparents, stating that, "They sacrificed everything so we could have normal lives." When asked about the chances of a reunion with his biological parents, Jon said there was "absolutely none," and elaborated that "There's nothing that could come from it that would be good. It would just probably throw me back into trauma. I don't want to put myself through that. I have nothing to gain from it."

Disappearance of Jonelle Matthews

Jonelle Matthews was a 12-year-old girl, who disappeared on December 20, 1984. She remained missing for 34 years, until her remains were discovered on July 24, 2019 by workers constructing a new pipeline. Disappearance: Jonelle was a member of the Franklin Middle School Choir, which performed at IntraWest Bank of Denver in the evening of December 20, 1984. Jonelle's father was at his other daughter's basketball game. Jonelle's mother had flown east to be with Jonelle's grandfather, who was ill. At 8:15 PM, Jonelle arrived at her home in Greeley, Colorado, after getting a ride from her friend DeeAnn Ross and DeeAnn's father. Shortly after 8:30 PM, Jonelle answered a phone call and took a message for her father. That phone call was the last time anyone heard from Jonelle. Her father arrived home at 9:30 PM and found the garage door open, but no one was home, although Jonelle's shoes and a shawl were near a heater in the family room, where Jonelle often sat. Jonelle's sister got home at 10:00 PM, but had not seen her. Their father began to worry, and called police. The police arrived at 10:15 PM. They found footprints in the snow, indicating that someone had been looking in the windows. There were no signs of a struggle or of forced entry. With snow on the ground, her father thought it unlikely that she would go far without shoes. Family: Jonelle Matthews lived at 320, 43rd Avenue Court in Greeley, Colorado (coordinates 40.4298503°N 104.7492455°W) with her adoptive parents Jim and Gloria Matthews, and her older sister Jennifer. Her father was the principal of Platte Valley Elementary School (coordinates 40.3912474°N 104.5586412°W) in Kersey, Colorado. For several weeks after the disappearance, the police placed Jonelle's birth mother Terri Vierra-Martinez under surveillance, without ever telling her that her daughter had gone missing. Ten years later and after Jonelle was declared legally dead, Gloria received a letter from the birth mother, requesting permission to visit the child she gave up for adoption, something Jonelle always wanted. The birth mother had used a search consultant to help locate the child. The adoptive parents notified the birth mother about what happened, and the families became friends. Jim and Gloria Matthews, retired and moved to Costa Rica. Jonelle's older sister moved to Washington state, living under the name Jennifer Morgensen. Public interest: The disappearance attracted public interest, including the president and members of congress. President Ronald Reagan mentioned Jonelle Matthews in a speech on March 7, 1985, in Room 450 of the Old Executive Office Building. She was mentioned in the Congressional Record for the United States House of Representatives on April 2, 1985, page 7224. In 2010, the Greeley Tribune published another summary of the missing child—still not found. As recently as 2018, Greeley Police have been re-contacting witnesses and applying the latest forensic advances to learn what happened to Jonelle. She appears in the International Center for Unidentified and Missing Persons' database. A chokecherry tree was planted nearly 30 years ago in front of Franklin Middle School. The tree is now gone, along with a plaque inscribed with Jonelle's name. Discovery of Remains: After almost 35 years, excavators installing a pipeline discovered human remains at 4:50 PM on Tuesday, July 23, 2019 near the intersection of county roads 34.5 and 49, at coordinates 40.239848°N 104.602514°W, about 15 mi (24 km) southeast of Jonelle's home. Based on DNA evidence, the Weld County Coroner’s Office positively identified the remains as Jonelle Matthews. As of July 29, 2019 the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has not released any information about how Matthews might have died, but have stated that the case is being treated as a homicide. Authorities are searching historical records to determine who owned or lived on the land where the remains were found. On September 13, 2019, Greeley Police Department announced a "person of interest" of Jonelle Matthew's abduction and murder. The person of interest is named, Steve Pankey, who ran for governor in Idaho in 2014 and 2018, and for lieutenant governor in 2010. His home in Colorado was searched under a warrant that stated investigators had probable cause to believe that Pankey abducted and murdered the girl that night. Pankey and his former wife lived only 2 miles away from the Matthews home where Jonelle was last seen. Greeley Police Commander Roy Smith stated that Pankey “had made repeated efforts to speak with detectives” about the Matthews case. But after detectives traveled to Twin Falls Idaho on August 15, 2019, Pankey refused to answer questions. Commander Smith stated Pankey has not been charged with Jonelle’s murder, but he is being investigated in relation to her death.

Disappearance of Damien Nettles

Damien Nettles disappeared from the Isle of Wight on November 2, 1996 when he was 16. The investigation into his disappearance has been ongoing ever since, with five men arrested in 2011, although no charges have been brought. The case: The case has, over the years, attracted significant media coverage, in part due to its mysterious nature – Damien was last seen in a fish and chip shop near his home in Cowes, and then never again, indicating his death. Surviving CCTV footage shows Nettles trying to order at a local chip shop, in a confused state. Multiple witnesses from the evening claim he appeared heavily intoxicated, or looked "spaced out", and his friends recall him possibly trying to acquire drugs. However, other footage of the night in question was lost by Hampshire Police, preventing the full corroboration of witness accounts which had begun to piece together a narrative regarding Nettles' last movements. As reported in the documentary Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared the police originally claimed that the man responsible for collecting video footage had lost the tapes after police had returned them, but records relating to evidence proved that was not the case. In episode five of Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared Nettles' mother expresses frustration at the police's handling of her son's disappearance, which had led to an official complaint on her part. Frustration is also expressed at the police's refusal to be interviewed about the disappearance for TV in 2016, and although the police maintain that Nettles' case remains open, she states dissatisfaction about what this actually entails. Nettles' mother comments 'if they'd done it right the first time I wouldn't be here now'. Crucial records, including the log of calls made to police that night are gone, police notebooks were not retained, and even details of which officers were on duty that night have now been lost. There have been several public campaigns to bring attention to his case. Disappearance: Various theories have emerged to explain Damien's disappearance, including that he owed money to drug dealers. Rumours have persistently alleged that a local drug dealer, Nicky McNamara, who was in the area on the night Nettles vanished, was involved. Witness accounts include recollections of McNamara holding a boy up against a wall whose physique matched Nettles'. Associates of McNamara were arrested, and released. The documentary Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared also mentions rumours of McNamara shortly after Nettles' disappearance referring to himself as a 'damned man', and of him incinerating suspicious objects outside his house. The documentary also mentions McNamara possibly making a 'deathbed confession' about Nettles before dying of a heroin overdose. In 2013, the police put up a reward for new information leading to solving the case. On 25 July 2016, a BBC Three series, Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared, was broadcast about the case.

1993 child sexual abuse accusations against Michael Jackson

In the summer of 1993, a Los Angeles-based dentist and screenwriter named Evan Chandler publicly accused American singer Michael Jackson of sexually abusing his 13-year-old son, Jordan Christopher "Jordy" Chandler. Case files state that the relationship between Jackson and Jordan began in February 1993, but other sources cite May 1992. Jordan's stepfather, a car dealer named David Schwartz, introduced the boy to the singer after Jackson rented a vehicle from Schwartz's dealership. Chandler initially encouraged the friendship. In the summer, Chandler confronted his ex-wife June, who had custody of Jordan, with suspicions that their son had been in an inappropriate relationship with Jackson, but June dismissed his worries. On July 15, Dr. Mathis Abrams, a psychiatrist, sent Chandler's attorney Barry Rothman a letter stating there was "reasonable suspicion" of sexual abuse. He wrote that if there was a child abuse claim, he would be required by law to contact the Los Angeles County Department of Children's Services. On August 4, Chandler and Jordan met with Jackson and Anthony Pellicano, Jackson's private investigator, and Evan Chandler read out Abrams' letter. He then opened negotiations to resolve the issue with a financial settlement. Chandler and Rothman had rejected a $350,000 offer from Jackson. On September 14, 1993, the Chandlers filed a lawsuit against Jackson for sexual battery, seduction, willful misconduct, intentional infliction of emotional distress, fraud and negligence. On August 24, 1993, as the third leg of Jackson's Dangerous World Tour began, news of the allegations broke to the public and received worldwide media attention. Jackson canceled the remainder of the tour due to health problems arising from the scandal. In January 1994, Jackson reached a financial settlement for $23 million with the Chandlers. In September 1994, the criminal investigation was closed after the Chandlers declined to cooperate, leaving the case without its main witness. The allegations affected Jackson's public image and commercial standing, and several endorsement deals were canceled, including Jackson's decade-long Pepsi endorsement. Similar allegations were made by other parties in 2005, leading to a trial in which Jackson was found not guilty. In November 2009, five months after Jackson's death, Evan Chandler was found dead from suicide by gunshot at his luxury apartment in Jersey City, New Jersey, after several years of depression and estrangement from his family. Allegations: According to the case files, Jordan Chandler first met Jackson in February 1993 when Jackson’s car broke down and he sought help from the boy’s stepfather David Schwartz, who ran a rental car company. Their friendship became so close that the National Enquirer ran a featured story with the title "Michael's New Adopted Family". The story implied that Jackson had "stolen" the boy from his estranged father, Evan Chandler, a dentist. Jackson invited Jordan, his stepsister and his mother to visit his Neverland Ranch on the weekends. They would also take trips to Las Vegas and Florida. These trips interfered with Jordan's scheduled visits with his father, with Jordan preferring to visit Neverland Ranch. In May 1993, when Jackson and Jordan stayed with Chandler, Chandler urged Jackson to spend more time with his son and suggested that Jackson build an addition to the house so that Jackson could stay there. After the zoning department said this could not be built, Chandler suggested that Jackson build him a new home. That month, Jordan and June flew with Jackson to Monaco for the World Music Awards. According to June's lawyer, Michael Freeman, "Evan began to get jealous of the involvement and felt left out." Upon their return, Chandler was pleased with a five-day visit from Jackson, during which Jackson slept in a room with Jordan and his stepbrother. Chandler said this is when he became suspicious of sexual misconduct by Jackson, although he said that Jackson and Jordan were clothed when he saw them in bed together, and has never claimed to have witnessed sexual misconduct. Jordan and Jackson's contact ended in June 1993. On July 2, 1993, in a private telephone conversation, Chandler – who was unknowingly being recorded by Dave Schwartz – said: There was no reason why (Jackson) had to stop calling me. I picked the nastiest son of a bitch I could find (Chandler's lawyer Barry Rothman), all he wants to do is get this out in the public as fast as he can, as big as he can and humiliate as many people as he can. He's nasty, he's mean, he's smart and he's hungry for publicity. Everything's going to a certain plan that isn't just mine. Once I make that phone call, this guy is going to destroy everybody in sight in any devious, nasty, cruel way that he can do it. I've given him full authority to do that. Jackson is an evil guy, he is worse than that and I have the evidence to prove it. If I go through with this, I win big-time. There's no way I lose. I will get everything I want and they will be destroyed forever. Michael's career will be over. In the same conversation, when asked how this would affect his son, Chandler replied: That's irrelevant to me. It will be a massacre if I don't get what I want. It's going to be bigger than all us put together. This man (Jackson) is going to be humiliated beyond belief. He will not sell one more record. However, discussing Jordan's upbringing, Chandler told Schwartz: You don’t have any right to all of a sudden decide that you’re going to be a good father or have a conversation about what’s right to do. I’ve never condemned you for it. I know what you’re going through (tape irregularity) that. I understand you have to stay away in order to be a normal human being. I understand that, but no one’s gonna give a shit about that in court. You and I live (tape irregularity) but I’m still living through it every day at my office, and it’s just bad for me too, believe me, and I understand you really well, and I know why (tape irregularity) she’ll make you look bad in one second. Schwartz replied: Yeah. I don’t disagree with that. And Chandler responded: Okay. Well, this time it’s gonna be the other way around because she — you see, I love him so much that I’m willing to destroy my own life to protect him. The recorded conversation was a critical aspect of Jackson's defense against the allegations made against him. Jackson and his supporters argued that he was the victim of a jealous father whose only goal was to extort money from him. The tape was first publicly released by Pellicano, after edits had been made. In October 1994, Mary A. Fischer of GQ magazine reported it was Chandler who initially accused Jackson of molesting his son, before he demanded a screenwriting deal from Jackson instead of going to the police. Following a five month investigation into the alleged extortion, deputy Los Angeles County District Attorney, Montagna, released a public statement stating no charges of extortion were brought against Chandler, citing Jackson's lawyers' failure to file for extortion in a timely manner and Jackson's willingness to negotiate with the boy's father for several weeks, which Montagna then goes on to explain that settlements were encouraged as it is what the law favored. Montagna also said the discussions between Jackson’s representatives and Barry K. Rothman, the attorney for the boy’s father at that time, appeared to be attempts to settle a possible civil case, not efforts to extort money. We’ve declined to file today criminal charges of attempted extortion. The evidence does not show that any crime has been committed. — Michael J. Montagna Use of sedatives: According to Taraborrelli, Chandler admitted that he had used the controversial sedative sodium amytal when he extracted a tooth from Jordan in early August 1993. Sodium amytal is a barbiturate that puts people in a hypnotic state when injected intravenously. Studies done in 1952 demonstrated that it enabled false memories to be implanted. Dr. Phillip Resnick, a Cleveland psychiatrist, said it was "a psychiatric medication" and, "People will say things under sodium amytal that are blatantly untrue". In May 1994, in Napa County, California, Gary Ramona won a lawsuit against his daughter's therapist and the psychiatrist who had given her sodium amytal. The psychiatrist claimed the drug helped Ramona's daughter remember specific details of molestation by Ramona, but a court brief written by Martin Orne, a University of Pennsylvania psychiatrist who pioneered research of hypnosis and sodium amytal, stated that the drug is "not useful in ascertaining 'truth' . . . The patient becomes sensitive and receptive to suggestions due to the context and to the comments of the interviewers." This was the first successful legal challenge to the "repressed memory phenomenon". Dr. Kenneth Gottlieb, a San Francisco psychiatrist, said: "It's absolutely a psychiatric drug. I would never want to use a drug that tampers with a person's unconscious unless there was no other drug available. And I would not use it without resuscitating equipment, in case of an allergic reaction, and only with an M.D. anesthesiologist present." According to Dr. John Yagiela, coordinator of the anesthesia and pain control department of the UCLA School of Dentistry, "It's unusual for it to be used for pulling a tooth" and "better, safer alternatives are available." On May 3, 1994, KCBS-TV reported that Chandler claimed the drug was used for tooth extraction and that Jordan was under the influence of the drug when the controversy broke. Mark Torbiner, the dental anesthesiologist who administered the drug, told GQ that if sodium amytal was used, "it was for dental purposes." According to Diane Dimond of the tabloid TV program Hard Copy, Torbiner's records show that Robinul and Vistaril were administered instead of sodium amytal. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration was investigating Torbiner's administration of drugs during house calls, where he mostly gave patients morphine and Demerol. His credentials with the Board of Dental Examiners indicated that he was restricted by law to administering drugs solely for dental-related procedures, but he had not adhered to those restrictions. For instance, he had given general anesthetic to Barry Rothman during hair-transplant procedures. Torbiner had introduced Chandler and Rothman in 1991, when Rothman needed dental work. Negotiations: In early August, the parties of Jackson and Chandler engaged in unsuccessful out-of-court negotiations. Chandler and his legal team asked for $20 million, or threatened to take the dispute to a criminal court. Jackson refused, saying, "No way in hell." A few weeks later, Jackson's legal team gave a counter-offer of $1 million, declined by Chandler who then requested $15 million. Jackson refused and lowered his offer to $350,000, which Chandler also refused. With both sides unable to reach an agreement, Chandler decided to take the matter to court. On September 2, 1993, Pellicano stated he made the offers in an attempt to catch Chandler's negotiating and recorded one of the telephone calls to Rothman to demonstrate this. However, on the call, the subject of blackmail was only fleetingly referenced by Pellicano. According to the Los Angeles Times, "illicit tape recordings are generally not admissible as evidence in criminal cases, but California law makes an exception in cases where extortion is threatened." Howard Weitzman turned over the tapes to the district attorney's office. Allegations made public and investigation: On July 15, 1993, Dr. Mathis Abrams sent Evan Chandler's attorney Barry Rothman a letter stating there was "reasonable suspicion" of sexual abuse. On August 17, over a three-hour session, Jordan told Abrams he had been abused by Jackson that went on for several months, which included kissing, masturbation and oral sex. Jordan repeated these allegations to police and gave a description of what he alleged was Jackson's penis. On August 18, the Los Angeles Police Department's Sexually Exploited Child Unit began a criminal investigation into Jackson. June Chandler initially told police that she did not believe Jackson molested her son, however her position wavered a few days later. On August 21, a search warrant was issued, allowing police to search Neverland Ranch. Police questioned thirty children who were friends of Jackson, they all stated that he was not a child molester. Gary Hearne, Jackson's chauffeur, testified in his deposition to driving Jackson to Jordan Chandler's house at night, and collecting Jackson in the morning for a period of about thirty days. On the day the allegations were made public, August 24, Jackson began the third leg of his Dangerous World Tour, in Bangkok. That same day, Anthony Pellicano held a press conference accusing Chandler of trying to extort $20 million from the singer. He did not mention that Jackson had made several counter-offers. The Jackson family also held a press conference, saying it was their "unequivocal belief" that Michael was a victim of extortion. On August 26, Jackson's promoters publicly released an audiotape of him apologizing to his fans for cancelling his second show in two days. The police also began an investigation into Evan Chandler, finding that he was $68,400 behind in his child support payments despite being well-paid as a dentist. In September 1993, police officers traveled to the Philippines to interview two of Jackson's ex-housekeepers. However, the ex-employees lacked credibility due to a back salary argument they had with Jackson. On November 8, police also searched the Jackson family home, Hayvenhurst. Several parents of Jackson's children friends complained of aggressive investigative techniques by police. They claimed the police frightened their children with lies such as "we have nude photos of you", and told parents their children had been molested even though their children had denied it. According to the county's DCFS reports on August 26, Jordan Chandler had difficulty remembering the times and dates of his alleged molestation. "However, the minor was consistent in his story," one document stated. Another investigation source said, "There's no medical evidence, no taped evidence. The search warrant at Jackson's home didn't result in anything that would support a criminal filing." The child abuse case file read that Jordan first told his father about the alleged abuse, in spite of Jackson's alleged threats. Jordan claimed that he and his father then met with Jackson and his lawyers, "and confronted him with allegations in an effort to make a settlement and avoid a court hearing." Evan Chandler had unsuccessfully sought a $20-million movie production and financing deal with Jackson and wanted a settlement to avoid going to court. On August 31, attorney Gloria Allred held a press conference stating she had been retained on behalf of the Chandlers, and implied a civil suit against Jackson would be made. On September 10, Allred said that she was off the case, declining further comment as to why. On September 13, the Chandlers hired Larry R. Feldman, former Los Angeles County Bar Association president. Brett Barnes, aged eleven, publicly said he had shared a bed with Jackson, but insisted there was no sexual abuse: "I was on one side of the bed and he was on the other. It was a big bed." Wade Robson, aged ten, told Fox Television that he too shared a bed with Jackson but nothing sexual happened. On October 6, 1993, Jordan Chandler underwent a psychiatric interview with Dr. Richard Gardner in New York. Dr. Gardner had formulated Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) in 1985, a disorder that arises primarily in the context of child-custody disputes. Jordan gave his account of what allegedly happened between him and Jackson in May 1993, during their trip to Monaco for the World Music Awards. A former security guard made various allegations about Jackson, saying he was fired because he "knew too much," and alleged that he was ordered by Jackson to destroy a photo of a naked boy. Instead of reporting this alleged event to the police, he sold the story to Hard Copy for $150,000. On December 13, 1993, Jackson's maid, Blanca Francia, alleged that she "quit in disgust" after seeing Jackson in a shower with a child, but did not inform the police. Lisa D. Campbell reported that Francia had been fired in 1991 and had sold her story to Hard Copy for $20,000. However, when Diane Dimond interviewed Francia on the show, she denied being fired but acknowledged being compensated by Hard Copy. On December 2, 1993, attorney Charles Mathews held a press conference about his clients allegedly being threatened and harassed by Anthony Pellicano's machinations. Mathews was representing Jackson's former security guards in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed on November 22. The lawsuit alleged wrongful termination due to "firsthand personal knowledge of many of Michael Jackson's nighttime visits with young boys." Allegation by La Toya Jackson: On December 8, 1993, Jackson's sister La Toya Jackson, who had been estranged from the family and not seen him for several years, claimed her brother was a pedophile. She further claimed that she had seen checks made out to different boys' families and that Jackson's own childhood physical abuse had turned him into an abuser. She and her then-husband Jack Gordon also said that Jackson had tried to kidnap and kill her. On December 9, La Toya Jackson repeated her suspicions to Katie Couric on Today: "I do know he'd have boys over all the time and they'd stay in his room for days. Then they would come out...there'd be another boy and he'd bring someone else but never two at a time." La Toya claimed to have proof of Jackson's pedophilia and offered to disclose it for $500,000. A bidding war between US and UK tabloids began, but fell through, when as J. Randy Taraborrelli wrote, "she didn't have much to offer, after all." The rest of the family disowned her, and in later years she insisted she had been forced to make the allegations by her husband Jack Gordon. Just prior to making the allegations, Gordon had been arrested for assaulting her and three years later, the couple divorced. By the turn of the millennium Jackson had forgiven his sister. La Toya Jackson, on repeated occasions, recanted all of her allegations against her brother, claiming she had been forced by her late husband to make such statements. In 2009, she recanted her 1993 statements to Barbara Walters, saying that her brother was not a pedophile and never had any improper contact with a child. Lisa Marie Presley: According to Chris Cadman, Jackson met Lisa Marie Presley around May 26, 1974, during a Jackson 5 engagement in Lake Tahoe. Her father, Elvis Presley, was closing a two-week engagement at the Sahara Tahoe while the Jackson 5 were just about to begin one. In November 1992, Jackson was reconnected with Presley through a mutual friend, and they talked almost every day by telephone. As the abuse accusations became public, he became dependent on Presley for emotional support; she was concerned about his faltering health. She stated, "I believed he didn't do anything wrong and that he was wrongly accused and yes I started falling for him. I wanted to save him. I felt that I could do it." She described him in one call as high, incoherent and delusional. He proposed to her over the phone in late 1993, saying, "If I asked you to marry me, would you do it?" They divorced less than two years later. Jackson's health: Jackson took painkillers for his scalp surgeries, administered due to the Pepsi commercial accident in 1984, and became dependent on them to deal with the stress of the allegations. Within a few months of the allegations becoming news, he had lost approximately 10 pounds and stopped eating. According to Jackson, he had a tendency to stop eating when "really upset or hurt" and his friend Elizabeth Taylor had to make him eat: "She took the spoon and would put it into my mouth." He said that he eventually became unconscious and had to be fed intravenously. In a court deposition unrelated to the alleged child abuse, Jackson appeared drowsy, lacked concentration and slurred while speaking. He said he could not remember the dates of his album releases or the names of people he had worked with, and took several minutes to name some of his recent albums. On November 12, Jackson canceled the remainder of his tour and flew with Taylor and her husband to London. When Jackson arrived at the airport, he had to be held up. He was rushed to the home of Elton John's manager and afterward to a clinic. When he was searched for drugs on entry, 18 vials of medicine were found in a suitcase. Jackson booked the whole fourth floor of the clinic and was put on a Valium IV to wean him from painkillers. While in the clinic, he took part in group and one-on-one therapy sessions. On November 15, Jackson's lawyer, Bert Fields, spoke publicly of their last meeting in Mexico City and Jackson's painkiller addiction: "Michael's life was in danger if he continued taking these massive quantities of drugs. He was barely able to function adequately on an intellectual level." Fields insisted that a U.S. drug rehabilitation center would not have the privacy Jackson wanted. He also stated that his client was not trying to evade an investigation: "If Michael Jackson wanted an excuse to stay out of the United States, all he had to do is stay on his tour." On November 23, Fields resigned from the case. Strip search: On February 10, 1993, ten months before the search, Jackson had revealed in a televised interview that he had vitiligo, a skin disorder that destroys skin pigmentation and creates blotches. The interview was watched by 90 million viewers, and after it aired expert information on vitiligo was widely shared in the media. According to Pellicano, Jordan Chandler said in July 1993 that Jackson did lift his shirt once to show the blotches on his skin. On December 20, 1993, investigators for the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department and the LAPD issued Jackson with a warrant for a strip search, as police wanted to verify Jordan's description of Jackson's private anatomy. The officers photographed Jackson's entire body. The police were looking for discoloration, any signs of vitiligo that Jordan had spoken about, or any other skin disorder. Refusal to comply would have been used in court as an indication of guilt. Those present for the prosecution were District Attorney Tom Sneddon, a detective, a photographer, and a doctor. Those present on behalf of Jackson were his two attorneys, a physician, a detective, a bodyguard, and a photographer. The attorneys and Sneddon agreed to leave the room when the examination took place. At Jackson's insistence, the prosecution detective also left. In an emotional state, Jackson stood on a platform in the middle of the room and disrobed. The search lasted for approximately 25 minutes. He was never touched. On January 28, 1994, Reuters and USA Today reported that an unidentified source informed them, "The pictures simply didn't match the boy's description." According to LAPD detective and pedophilia expert Bill Dworin, who spoke to NBC News in February 2003, Jordan's description comported with the photos of Jackson's genitalia. Dworin did not believe that Jordan Chandler's accusations were coached. The DA and the sheriff's photographer stated that the description was accurate, but the jurors felt that the photos did not match the description. In March 1994, Jackson's mother Katherine was called to testify in front of the LA County Grand Jury. Investigators asked whether her son had altered the appearance of his genitalia. Jordan claimed that Jackson was circumcised. However, Jackson's autopsy report showed that he had not been circumcised and his foreskin appeared intact, with no signs of surgical restoration. On January 4, 1994, Larry Feldman filed a court motion in an effort to obtain the police photographs of Jackson. The motion stated a "multiple choice" request: either provide copies of the photographs, submit Jackson to a second search, or the court can bar the photographs from the civil trial as evidence. Feldman said that the district attorney's office previously refused the request of these photographs. Jackson’s lawyers asked a Santa Barbara County judge to order prosecutors to return the nude photographs, fearing they would become public, but were denied. Jackson's response: On December 22, 1993, Jackson responded to events for the first time via satellite from Neverland Ranch: As you may already know, after my tour ended I remained out of the country undergoing treatment for a dependency on pain medication. There have been many disgusting statements made recently concerning allegations of improper conduct on my part. These statements about me are totally false. I will say I am particularly upset by the handling of the mass—matter by the incredible, terrible mass media. At every opportunity, the media has dissected and manipulated these allegations to reach their own conclusions. I ask all of you to wait and hear the truth before you label or condemn me. Don't treat me like a criminal, because I am innocent. I have been forced to submit to a dehumanizing and humiliating examination. It was the most humiliating ordeal of my life, one that no person should ever have to suffer. But if this is what I have to endure to prove my innocence, my complete innocence, so be it. On January 5, 1994, a few weeks before the settlement, Jackson gave a five-minute speech at the 26th NAACP Image Awards asserting his innocence and received a standing ovation. During the ceremony, one presenter had included Jackson in a list of names, calling him "Michael (Innocent Until Proven Guilty) Jackson." A poll at the time, conducted by A Current Affair, found that nearly 75 percent of Americans believed Jackson was telling the truth. Media reaction: Most of the information available on the allegations was released (officially or unofficially) by the prosecution and unchallenged by Jackson. He was largely portrayed as guilty by the media, which used sensational headlines implying guilt when the content itself did not support the headline. Stories were purchased of his alleged criminal activity, police investigation material was leaked, and unflattering photographs of Jackson were printed. Two weeks after the allegations were reported, the headline "Michael Jackson: A Curtain Closes" reflected the attitude of most tabloid media. The New York Post ran the headline "Peter Pan or pervert". In a piece for Hard Copy, Dimond—a journalist who spent the next fifteen years trying to prove Jackson was a pedophile—ran a story stating it had acquired "new documents in the criminal investigation of Michael Jackson, and they are chilling; they contain the name of child movie actor Macaulay Culkin". In fact, the document stated that Culkin denied being abused by Jackson. Two tabloid media outlets bought confidential leaked documents from the LAPD for $20,000. A number of Jackson's former employees—most of whom had worked at Neverland—sold stories which alleged prior sexual misconduct on Jackson's part, instead of reporting their claims to police. One couple asked for $100,000, claiming that Jackson had sexually caressed Culkin. For a fee of $500,000, they would also allege that Jackson put his hands down Culkin's pants. Culkin strongly denied the allegation and did so again in court during Jackson's 2005 trial. When Jackson left the US to go into drug rehabilitation, the Daily Mirror (UK) held a "Spot the Jacko" contest, offering readers a trip to Disney World if they could correctly predict where he would appear next. A Daily Express headline read "Drug treatment star faces life on the run", while a News of the World headline said Jackson was a fugitive. These tabloids also falsely alleged that Jackson had traveled to Europe to have cosmetic surgery that would make him unrecognizable. Geraldo Rivera set up a mock trial, with a jury made up of audience members, even though Jackson had not been charged with a crime. Lawsuit: On September 14, 1993, Jordan Chandler and his parents filed a lawsuit against Jackson. The lawsuit claimed that Jackson had committed sexual battery, seduction, willful misconduct, intentional infliction of emotional distress, fraud and negligence. In November, Jackson's lawyers asked the case be put on hold for as long as six years or until the criminal case was concluded. Concerns about a civil trial during an ongoing criminal investigation, and prosecutors' access to plaintiffs' civil trial information, stemmed from Jackson's Fifth Amendment rights. Since two grand juries deemed there was insufficient evidence for criminal charges by the end of the investigation, the prosecution could have been able to form the elements of a case around the defense strategy in the trial, creating a situation akin to double jeopardy. Superior Court Judge David M. Rothman ordered Jackson's deposition scheduled before the end of January 1994 but said he might reconsider if Jackson was indicted on criminal charges. Jackson agreed to be deposed on January 18. His attorneys said he was eager to testify, but also said they might oppose the deposition if criminal charges were filed or were still under consideration on his deposition date. They said if charges were filed, they would want the criminal trial to go first. However, when authorities notified Jackson's lawyers that they expected their investigation to continue at least through February, Jackson's team failed to win a delay of the civil case. Rothman denied the motion to delay the civil proceedings until the criminal investigation had been completed, and set March 21, 1994, as the trial start date. On December 17, 1993, Rothman allowed the prosecutors to receive information from Jackson's lawyers and approved discovery information for media disclosure. Both Feldman's and Jackson's camps expressed concerns about Jackson's right to a fair trial being compromised by publicly discussing discovery results. Johnnie Cochran and Howard Weitzman, attorneys representing Jackson, argued that investigators were trying to use the suit to advance their criminal investigation, a technique that should not be allowed. On January 24, 1994, prosecutors announced that they would not bring charges against Chandler for attempted extortion, as Jackson's camp had been slow to report an extortion claim to the police and had tried to negotiate a settlement for several weeks. Chandler had made his settlement demand in early August 1993, and the Jackson camp had filed extortion charges against the Chandler camp in late August. In the extortion investigation, a search warrant was never sought to search the homes and offices of Chandler and Barry Rothman. No grand jury convened when both men refused police interviews. In contrast, the police had searched Jackson's residences solely based on Jordan's allegations, and taken lengths to interview or intimidate witnesses. Weitzman said they had not gone to the police earlier because "It was our hope that this would all go away. We tried to keep it as much in-house as we could." In February 1994, the Santa Barbara County Grand Jury convened to assess whether criminal charges should be filed. The Los Angeles County Grand Jury began in March 1994. By 1994 prosecution departments in California had spent $2 million and convened two grand juries, but Jordan Chandler's allegations could not be corroborated. Settlement: Jackson's legal team would meet three times a week at Taylor's home to discuss the case. Eventually, it was agreed that Jackson was too sick to endure a lengthy trial and that he should settle out of court. The lawsuit was settled on January 25, 1994, with $15,331,250 to be held in a trust fund for Jordan, $1.5 million for each of his parents, and $5 million for the family's lawyer, for a total of approximately $23 million. According to a motion passed to Judge Melville in 2004, "the settlement was for global claims of negligence and the lawsuit was defended by Mr. Jackson's insurance carrier. The carrier negotiated and paid the settlement, over the protests of Mr. Jackson and his personal legal counsel." On January 29, 1994, the Associated Press reported that Jackson had requested his insurance company (Transamerica Insurance Group) to financially contribute to the settlement. A lawyer for TIG, Jordan Harriman, had made a "one-time-only" offer to Jackson on January 13 to resolve his claim. Jackson refused that offer but further negotiations followed. Russ Wardrip, a TIG claims analyst, had sent a January 13 registered letter to Jackson's lawyer, Howard Weitzman: acts of sexual activity do not constitute accidental bodily injury. Further, acts of sexual activity, especially those against a minor, are inherently intentional, wrongful and harmful. Coverage for such acts is precluded by the California Insurance Code. According to Jackson's attorney Thomas Mesereau, Jackson's insurance company was "the source of the settlement amounts", as noted in a 2005 memorandum in People v. Jackson. The memorandum also noted that "an insurance carrier has the right to settle claims covered by insurance where it decides settlement is expedient and the insured may not interfere with nor prevent such settlements", as established by a number of precedents in California. Defeating the right would involve convincing a court with the power to overrule the precedent that the earlier decision was either wrongly decided or more often, "clearly" wrong (depending on the criteria of the court) or the court must be convinced to distinguish the case. That is, to make the ruling narrower than that in the precedent due to some difference in facts between the current and precedent case while supporting the result reached in the earlier case. In 2004, Jackson's attorney Thomas Mesereau said: "People who intended to earn millions of dollars from Jackson's record and music promotions did not want negative publicity from these lawsuits interfering with their profits. Michael Jackson now regrets making these payments. These settlements were entered into with one primary condition – that condition was that Mr. Jackson never admitted any wrongdoing. He always denied doing anything wrong. Mr. Jackson now realizes the advice he received was wrong." Jackson explained why he had settled: "I wanted to go on with my life. Too many people had already been hurt. I want to make records. I want to sing. I want to perform again. It's my talent. My hard work. My life. My decision." He also wanted to avoid a "media circus". The settlement cannot be used as evidence of guilt in future civil and criminal cases. In 1994, Larry Feldman said "nobody bought anybody's silence" with the civil settlement. Bribery to not testify in a trial is a felony according to California Penal Code 138. Receiving such a bribe is also a felony according to this law. Closure of investigation: District Attorney Gil Garcetti said that the settlement did not affect criminal prosecution and that the investigation was ongoing. Jordan Chandler was interviewed after the settlement by detectives seeking evidence of child molestation, but no criminal charges were filed. On May 2, 1994, the Santa Barbara County grand jury disbanded without indicting Jackson, while a Los Angeles County grand jury continued to investigate the sexual abuse allegations. On April 11, 1994, the grand jury session in Santa Barbara was extended by 90 days, allowing DA Sneddon to gather more evidence. Prosecution sources said they were frustrated in their grand jury probe, failing to find direct evidence of the molestation charges. The final grand jury disbanded in July without returning an indictment against Jackson. The Chandlers stopped co-operating with the criminal investigation around July 6, 1994. The police never pressed criminal charges. Citing a lack of evidence without Jordan's testimony, the state closed its investigation on September 22, 1994. District attorney Sneddon and Lauren Weis, head of the county DA's Sex Crimes Unit, said that ending the investigation did not reflect any lack of faith in the alleged victims' credibility. The entire investigation involved two grand juries and more than 400 people interviewed over a period of 13 months. According to the grand juries, the evidence presented by the Santa Barbara police and the LAPD was not convincing enough to indict Jackson or subpoena him, even though grand juries can indict the accused purely on hearsay evidence. According to a 1994 report by Variety, a source in contact with the grand juries said that none of the witnesses had produced anything to directly implicate Jackson. According to a 1994 report by Showbiz Today, one of the grand jurors claimed they "did not hear any damaging testimony" during the hearings. FBI files released after Jackson's death also noted that the prosecution had no outstanding leads. Aftermath: A week after the settlement in January 1994, L.A. District Attorney Garcetti announced that he supported amending a law that prohibited sexual assault victims from being compelled to testify in criminal proceedings. The amendment, introduced into the state assembly in February, would have immediately allowed Garcetti to compel Jordan Chandler's testimony. On February 15, 1994, PBS Frontline aired the documentary Tabloid Truth: The Michael Jackson Story about the tabloid sensationalism, more preoccupied with selling papers than reporting an accurate narrative of the scandal. The documentary reported Jackson's housekeepers Mark and Faye Quindoy selling stories about Jackson for money, and bargaining for more money regarding child abuse allegations. They were depicted as untrustworthy. Phillip and Stella LeMarque, another pair of former employees to Jackson, sold a child abuse story to tabloids through pornographic film actor Paul Barresi, who once successfully sold a story to the National Enquirer. At the opportunity of the scandal, Barresi made a taped recording of alleged evidence and told the Globe that he intended to turn it over to the district attorney. The Globe and Baressi agreed on $15,000 for his story. Splash News journalist Kevin Smith said, "A lot of people who claimed to have witnessed Jackson doing this, that or the other—they weren't going to the police first. Their main interest was money, and they would come to journalists who could give them money. So in those circumstances, journalists know more about what happened than the police do." Three years later, Victor M. Gutierrez self-published a book on the relationship between Jordan Chandler and Jackson. Gutierrez claimed that the book is based on a diary Jordan had kept at the time and included details of alleged sexual encounters with Jackson. According to German newspaper Die Tageszeitung, Gutierrez attended meetings of North American Man Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), a group advocating the decriminalization of pedophilia and pederasty, as a reporter in the 1980's. He said the group thought of Jackson as "one of us" and they insisted that the relationship between Jordan and Jackson was romantic. In 1997, Jackson filed a civil suit against Gutierrez for slander after the writer claimed that he had a tape of Jackson having sex with his nephew Jeremy, son of Jermaine Jackson. The jury ruled in Jackson's favor, awarding him $2.7 million. Gutierrez fled to Chile after the suit. Jackson's attorney Zia Modabber said, "Jurors told us that they not only wanted to compensate Mr. Jackson and punish Victor Gutierrez, but to send a message that they are tired of tabloids lying about celebrities for money." Jackson also filed a $100 million lawsuit against Diane Dimond after she appeared on KABC morning show Ken and Barkley to discuss Gutierrez's alleged tape. After the report was broadcast, Jackson announced he would sue members of the media who "spread vicious lies and rumors about me in their attempts to make money, benefit their careers, sell papers or get viewers to watch their programs." It was dismissed in 1997. Jordan legally emancipated himself from his parents in 1994, at age 14. In 1996, Evan Chandler sued Jackson for around $60 million, claiming Jackson had breached an agreement never to discuss the case. In 1999, a court ruled in Jackson's favor and threw out the lawsuit. In 2006, Jordan accused his father of attacking him with a barbell, choking him and spraying his face with mace. The charges were dropped. On November 5, 2009, fourteen weeks after Jackson's death, Evan Chandler was found dead following an apparent suicide. Investigative journalist Charles Thomson noted a continued media bias against Jackson after Chandler's suicide. Thomson said he was contacted by a British tabloid to supply information about the 1993 allegations, only to have them replace his carefully researched information with the misinformation he advised them to avoid. According to Thomson, when Jackson's FBI file was released the following month, the media reported that it created the impression of guilt, even though the file supported his innocence. He noted that Gene Simmons' allegations in 2010 about Jackson molesting children received over a hundred times more coverage than his interview with Jackson's long-time guitarist, Jennifer Batten, who rebutted Simmons' claims. Effect on Jackson's career: Jackson's commercial appeal and public image declined in the wake of the allegations. The government of Dubai barred him from performing in response to an anonymous pamphlet campaign that attacked him as immoral. Jackson backed out of a deal to create a song and video to tie-in with the film Addams Family Values, returning an estimated $5 million, and a brand of fragrances was canceled because of Jackson's drug problems. On November 14, 1993, PepsiCo ended their ten-year partnership with him, causing some fans to boycott the company. According to conflicting sources, Jackson agreed to compose music for the video game Sonic the Hedgehog 3, but left the project and was uncredited, possibly due to the allegations. Jackson produced a special show for the premium cable network HBO, For One Night Only, to be recorded in front of a special invited audience at New York City's Beacon Theatre for broadcast in December 1995. The shows were canceled after Jackson collapsed at the theater on December 6 during rehearsals. Jackson was admitted overnight to Beth Israel Medical Center North. The shows were never rescheduled. The following year, Jackson began the HIStory World Tour. Despite the show's success, Jackson's only concerts in the USA were two shows at the Aloha Stadium in Honolulu, Hawaii. Jackson completed the video once planned for Addams Family Values and released it as Ghosts, with a framing story about an eccentric maestro who entertains children and is pursued by a bigoted local official. Jackson's album HIStory, released shortly after the allegations, "creates an atmosphere of paranoia," according to critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine. Its content focuses on the public struggles Jackson went through prior to its production. In the songs "Scream", "Tabloid Junkie", and "You Are Not Alone", Jackson expresses his anger and hurt at the media. In the ballad "Stranger in Moscow", he laments his "swift and sudden fall from grace". In "D.S.", he attacks a character identified as Tom Sneddon, the District Attorney that requested his strip search. He describes the person as a white supremacist who wanted to "get my ass, dead or alive". Sneddon said: "I have not, shall we say, done him the honor of listening to it, but I've been told that it ends with the sound of a gunshot." According to The Washington Post, the O.J. Simpson trial overshadowed Jackson's scandal. A source from the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office said the scandal took "a back seat since the Simpson case came up." Scriptwriter Alison Taylor said, "O.J. Simpson is the best thing that ever happened to Michael Jackson." Further allegations: On December 18, 2003, Jackson was charged with seven counts of child sexual abuse and two counts of administering an intoxicating agent to commit a child sexual abuse felony against Gavin Arvizo. Jackson denied the allegations. Sneddon again led the prosecution. The People v. Jackson trial began in Santa Maria, California, on January 31, 2005. The judge allowed testimony about past allegations, including the 1993 case, to establish whether the defendant had a propensity to commit certain crimes. However, Jordan Chandler had left the country to avoid testifying. Mesereau later said: "The prosecutors tried to get Chandler to show up and he wouldn't. If he had, I had witnesses who were going to come in and say he told them it never happened and that he would never talk to his parents again for what they made him say." June Chandler testified that she had not spoken to her son in 11 years. During her testimony, she claimed that she could not remember being counter-sued by Jackson and that she had never heard of her own attorney. She also said she never witnessed any molestation. Jackson was found not guilty of all charges on June 13, 2005. In 2019, Canadian filmmaker Danny Wu produced and released a documentary, Square One, which discusses the 1993 allegations and makes a case for Jackson's innocence. The film is narrated by Wu, along with British investigative journalist Charles Thomson. "Square One" features interviews with Jackson's nephew Taj Jackson, and a number of people who were featured on the witness list for Jackson's 2005 Child Molestation Trial.

Kidwelly sex cult

A cult operating in the Welsh town of Kidwelly raped children for decades until its perpetrators were caught in 2010. Its leader Colin Batley terrorised and psychologically coerced vulnerable children into having sex by death threats and brainwashing. Batley, three female members and a second man were convicted of child sex offences in 2011 and jailed. Cult: The cult sexually exploited vulnerable teenagers, using occult practices and literature as a means of justifying its abuse and of brainwashing its victims. It was led by Colin Batley and also run by his wife and three other women. Its sexual abuse against children spanned several decades and was carried out first in London, then in Kidwelly in South Wales. The five members who went on trial departed London for a single Kidwelly street in the 1990s. The leader Colin Batley moved first, followed by Shelly Millar, Batley's mistress Jacqueline Marling and their partners. Batley and three of the four female defendants were convicted of sexual offences. Colin Batley and the four female defendants indicated their membership with an ancient "Egyptian eye" tattoo of Horus, a hawk-headed god on their arms and by collecting ancient Egyptian idolatry. The cult targeted troubled vulnerable children, forcing them undergo an initiation ceremony that ended with sex with an adult. Children were intimidated into participating with threats of murder. One girl testified that after this ceremony, (which started with Batley preaching about the occult and finished with sex), she was regularly coerced into having sex with Colin Batley at his house and with strangers at satanic orgies. In tears, she testified "I did it because I was told to by Colin". A victim explained "Colin knew how to manipulate you, to make you believe anything he said". Children also obeyed his demands for sex out of "fear of angering the Gods." Batley had Rottweiler dogs that were "vicious to everyone". The sexual abuse was often preceded with satanic ceremonies in which passages from the occultist Aleister Crowley's books The Book of the Law, The Book of Magick and Equinox of the Gods were read out. One ceremony featured an altar with salted bread, a chalice of red wine and an incense burner. At the end of these satanic ceremonies, members "became skyclad" meaning they disrobed and had sex. A neighbour, John Wheatland, saw a girl in her early teens "done up to look like a film star" who asked him "do you want sex?" and he heard a victim crying every night. The Book of the Law: Aleister Crowley, whose literature was a major source of the cult's beliefs, was an English occultist, magician and arch-Satanist who died in 1947. He wrote The Book of the Law in Cairo in 1904. Each member's home seemed to have a laminated version of it. The trial heard this book had "worrying trends and themes" about sex, including the statements "Let all chaste women be despised", "Sex with anyone is not just permissible but to be encouraged. Prostitution is to be admired" and "Some of the most passionate and permanent attachments have begun with rape. Rome was founded thereon." Judge Paul Thomas QC admonished the book as "a ludicrous document". Death of Damian Batley: Colin Batley's son Damian died on 1 February 2008, when he accidentally hung himself during a sex act. He filmed the fatal accident on his mobile phone. An inquest was told he was found naked and hanging. A neighbour said Damian's father (Colin Batley) was "laughing and joking like he didn’t have a care in the world" on the day of the funeral, which "no normal person could comprehend". Similarity with other cults: According to the Cult Information Centre's general secretary Ian Haworth, the Kidwelly rape cult had the characteristics that are typical of a cult, which he had "heard year after year in the 32 years I've worked full time in this field". He estimated the UK has 500 to 1,000 cults, with these operating "in major cities" and "in quiet, rural areas". Haworth added that cult leaders often break people down, sometimes within three or four days, with methods including depriving them of food and sleep. He said this "seems to work best on people with very healthy minds". Victims: Five victims testified in court that they were lured or brought to cult members' homes where they were sexually abused and that there were more victims who had not reported any of their abuse. One 15 year old girl who gave evidence described being shared like a "sex toy" between cult members. A second victim was raped by Batley as an 11 year old girl and testified "Sex with him was a test and if I did not pass I would go to The Abyss." A third victim also testified to being raped by Batley when she was 11 or 12 and being coerced into having sex on camera when she was 16. Victims said the cult's abuse "has been a nightmare journey for each and every one of us". Annabelle Forest: Annabelle Forest, a daughter of cult member Jacqueline Marling, gave testimony which helped convict five abusers. She was forced at the age of seven to watch a sex act by her mother Jacqueline Marling on Colin Batley. When Forest was 11, Colin Batley raped her. In her early teens, she was coerced into group sex with Marling, which became something Forest was regularly forced to participate in. She was also coerced into a relationship with a second older male. Forest said "I was a schoolgirl by day and a sex slave at night", which "got so bad that at one point I tried to take my own life." Three months after giving birth to a child of Batley, aged 18, Forest was forced into prostitution, having sex with an estimated 1,800 men, with her entire earnings being taken by the cult. She said that during her many years of being abused and exploited: "Too many people looked away, too many people ignored the signs. It astonishes me that we lived in that small cul-de-sac for so many years and not one person saw anything that gave them cause for concern". Forest detailed her experiences in her book The Devil on the Doorstep: My Escape From a Satanic Sex Cult, which she wrote to get "others to start really paying attention to the community they live in" because "there are abused children everywhere". Investigation: In 2010, two adult victims, one male and one female, reported the cult's abuse to the police prompting the group's arrest the same year. Chief Inspector Richard Lewis said the investigation by Dyfed–Powys Police "was a very protracted and complicated inquiry involving a very secretive group" that perpetrated "systematic and prolonged abuse of children" who "showed great courage" by reporting it. Mark Bergmanski, Detective Chief Inspector, agreed "it was a very complicated and complex inquiry". The safeguarding children's board at Carmarthenshire County Council lambasted all perpetrators of "systematic, secretive and prolonged sexual abuse of children". Sentences: The cult's leader Colin Batley, three female members and a second man received prison sentences totalling 36 years, with the possibility of Colin Batley remaining in prison for life. They were found guilty on 47 charges including rape and other sexual crimes against children after a five week trial in February and March 2011. A fourth female member was acquitted after facing a single charge of child indecency. The head of the Welsh complex case unit in the Crown Prosecution Service said "all of those sentenced today are guilty of horrific crimes and therefore it is also right that they have received lengthy sentences". The jury deliberated for four full days and two half days, and were offered counselling, due to the distressing nature of the offences. The defendants had denied the cult's existence for the entire trial.

Saskatoon Foster Parent Scandal

The Foster Parent Scandal, also known as The Scandal of the Century, occurred in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. There were two similar events around the same time where an allegation of child sex abuse escalated into claims of satanic ritual abuse. The more widely known of the two is the Martensville satanic sex scandal, and the second but earlier story is of the Foster Parent Scandal in nearby Saskatoon. Media Coverage: A similar story arose in Martensville of sexual abuse also involving claims of a satanic nature, and occurred not long after the Foster Parent Scandal. As the media picked up the reporting on the claims of Satanic sex abuse, the reporting on the similar Foster Parent Scandal decreased and was overshadowed. In 2000, the CBC's The Fifth Estate reported on the events surrounding the case of reported foster parent abuse in a story titled "The Scandal of the Century". Local reporter Dan Zakreski, then with the Saskatoon StarPhoenix, also reported on the story. Further reporting on the case was published in The Globe and Mail. History: At the centre of the case were three children, Michael Ross (a.k.a. Tom Black) and his younger twin sisters Kathy and Michelle Ross (a.k.a. Julie and Mary Black). The three children entered the care of social services in 1987 after their parents, Helen and Don Ross (a.k.a. "Emma and Don Black"), were found to not be capable of adequately caring for their children. Michael's kindergarten teachers had reported that in 1986 (when Michael was seven years old) that he was behaving in sexually aggressive ways, including inappropriately touching other children, and undressing and inviting both other children and staff to have sex with him. When the children entered the foster home of Dale and Anita Klassen (a.k.a. "Scott" and "Emma Hepner") on February 13, 1987, the Klassens were not informed of the children's troubled history, nor provide any special assistance regarding the reported concerns. Shortly after the children arrived, Emma noticed that the children were engaging in sexually overt behaviour that included kissing, hugging, and being naked together in their playroom. Moreover, in April of that year, a babysitter reported to Emma that they had witnessed Michael inserting a butter knife and liquid soap into Michelle's vagina. The children were interviewed after this was reported to the police and the Sexual Assault Centre, but the only conclusion was that the children knew far more about sexual matters than they should for their age, but they were unable to determine if the children had ever been sexually assaulted. The report also noted that Michael, then eight years old, would sneak downstairs in the middle of the night to dress in lady's high heel shoes and pantyhose. When Helen Ross agreed to her children becoming permanent wards in November 1989, the Klassens agreed to care for Kathleen and Michelle, but were concerned by Michael's sexual and aggressive behaviours. Michael was transferred to a special foster home in nearby Warman run by Marilyn and Lyle Thompson, and shortly after his arrival, he alleged that his sisters had been abused in the Klassen home. As a result, Social Services investigated and removed the girls from the Klassen home and placed them in the same foster home as Michael. Foster mother Marilyn Thompson observed similar behaviours in the children that the Klassens had, and a medical exam found some evidence that was consistent with sexual abuse. There were also reports that the family dog had been subjected to sexual acts. The children began seeing a child therapist in private practice, Carol Bunko-Ruys. It was during the sessions with Bunko-Ruys that the children began making allegations that their parents, Helen and Don Ross, their mother's new partner, Don White (who later completed a lie detector test that demonstrated evidence suggesting he was innocent), the Klassens and several of the Klassen's relatives, including in-laws the Kvellos (a.k.a. "Marcuses"), Dale's parents, Peter and Marie (a.k.a. "Sophie"), and Dale's brother Richard had been abusing them. The allegations included that the adults had cut the children with knives, had forced the children to participate in orgies, have sex with dogs and flying bat-like creatures, consume blood urine, and feces, eat the eyeballs and flesh of roasted babies, and other satanic rituals. Saskatoon Police Cpl. Brian Dueck was called in to begin interviewing the children as the allegations escalated. During the interviews, the children recounted the acts of sexual abuse that had committed by Michael, but Cpl. Dueck deferred to the opinion and insistence of Bunko-Ruys in keeping the children together in the belief that it would make the children easier to treat. With the children together again, Michael's abuse of his sisters would resume for the next three years, and the stories of abuse the children told escalated. Eventually, 16 adults would be arrested and charged with over 70 counts of sexual assault, incest, and gross indecency, and went to trial in 1993. The charges against 12 of the 16 would be stayed due to lack of evidence. Peter Klassen would plead guilty in a plea deal to protect other members of his family, lost on a subsequent appeal, and would serve his sentence without parole. Don White would be convicted, but his conviction was later overturned in 1996 by the Supreme Court of Canada. Retrials were ordered for Helen and Don Ross, but the Crown did not pursue these retrials. Years later, the children would report a different account than they had previously, and admitted to lying when they were interviewed as children. One of the sisters, age 16 at the time, reported that "My brother was abusing me and my sister and we'd get manipulated to say it was the adults and not him." Michael would later sign an affidavit where he stated "I made up these stories because I felt pressured and was making up stories as we went along. Once I had made up some stories, I felt pressured not to deny them, and to make up more stories." The Klassen and Kvello families would eventually be paid $2.46 million by the Government of Saskatchewan in a 2004 damages agreement following a 2003 court case. Kathy and Michelle Ross would receive $560,000 from the Government of Saskatchewan in a lawsuit settlement related to the abuse they suffered while in foster care. Martensville satanic sex scandal: In nearby Martensville in 1992, a similar case occurred that also involved children in care, allegations of sexual abuse, and allegations of satanic cults and rituals. The events of the case occurred after the Foster Parent Scandal events, but were overshadowed by the media coverage of the Martensville case. That case was centred around the Sterling family and the children in their day care. The two cases are often confused as a result of their neighbouring location and time of the events, as well as the nature of the events.

Murder of Milly Dowler

On 21 March 2002, Amanda Jane "Milly" Dowler, a 13-year-old English schoolgirl, was reported missing by her parents after failing to return home from school and not being seen since walking along Station Avenue in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, that afternoon. Following an extensive search for her, her remains were discovered in Yateley Heath Woods in Yateley, Hampshire, on 18 September. On 23 June 2011, Levi Bellfield, who was already serving three life sentences for the murders of Marsha McDonnell and Amélie Delagrange and the attempted murder of Kate Sheedy, was found guilty of abducting and murdering Dowler and sentenced to an additional whole-life tariff. On 27 January 2016, Surrey Police announced that Bellfield had admitted to abducting, abusing and killing Dowler. Following their daughter's death, Dowler's parents established a charity called Milly's Fund to "promote public safety, and in particular the safety of the children and young people." The case generated debate over the treatment of victims and witnesses in court, after Dowler's family criticised the way they were cross-examined during Bellfield's trial. Dowler's murder played a significant role in the News of the World phone-hacking scandal. In 2011, media reported that News of the World reporters had accessed Dowler's voicemail after she was reported missing, giving her parents hope she was still alive. The resulting outcry from the British public contributed to the closure of the newspaper and led to a range of investigations and inquiries into phone hacking and media ethics in British media. The case is notable for attracting more attention from the media when compared to other similar cases that happened at the same time (such as the murder of Hannah Williams). Disappearance: At 3:07pm on 21 March 2002, Dowler left Heathside School in Weybridge and walked to Weybridge railway station with a friend. The girls got off at Walton-on-Thames railway station, one stop before Dowler's usual stop of Hersham, and went to eat at the station cafe. After Dowler telephoned her father at 3:47 pm to say she would be home in half an hour, the girls left the cafe at 4:05, with Dowler walking home alone. She was last seen three minutes later,[5] walking along Station Avenue, by a friend of her sister, who was waiting at a bus stop. A closed-circuit television camera located further along the road showed no images of Dowler. A red Daewoo Nexia, which belonged to Levi Bellfield's girlfriend Emma Mills, was photographed driving past by the same camera at 4:32 pm In an April 2009 interview, Bellfield said that he was driving the car. When Dowler failed to return home, she was reported missing to the police at 7:00 pm. A nationwide search for her followed, with 100 police officers and helicopters searching fields, streets and rivers around Hersham. Detectives who had investigated the abduction of Sarah Payne were called in to help. Police and the Dowler family made many appeals for information, including a reconstruction on Crimewatch UK. The Crimewatch UK appeal included a direct appeal to Dowler in the hope that she had run away from home of her own accord. A plea was also made by Pop Idol winner Will Young, whose concert Dowler had attended shortly before her disappearance. Dowler's mother expressed hope that her daughter had run away, but said that she could not think of a reason why she would want to do so. The Independent reported in 2011 that Dowler had, some time previously, written a mock leaving-home letter and notes showing she had been unhappy. A week after Dowler's disappearance, the police stated that she was probably not taken by force. They reasoned that while she was unlikely to have gone off with someone she did not know of her own free will, no-one had come forward who had witnessed a struggle, despite a number of apparent sightings of her prior to her disappearance. On 23 April 2002, the discovery of a body in the River Thames prompted media speculation that the remains might be those of Dowler, but the body was identified the following day as that of 73-year-old Maisie Thomas, who went missing in March 2001, and whose death was not believed to be suspicious. In June 2002, despite further searches, the offer of a £100,000 reward by national tabloid newspaper The Sun and her parents continuing to send text messages to her mobile telephone in hope of a reply, Dowler remained missing. That month, police told her parents that she was probably dead. Body discovery and murder investigation: On 18 September 2002, nude human remains were discovered by mushroom pickers in Yateley Heath Woods near Yateley, Hampshire. They were later confirmed through dental records as Dowler's. Due to the severity of the decomposition, the cause of death could not be ascertained. No items of Dowler's clothing or possessions—the purse, rucksack or mobile phone—she had with her at the time of her disappearance have ever been recovered. The discovery of the body led the police to reclassify the case from a missing person to a homicide investigation. Undertaken by Surrey Police, the investigation was code-named Operation Ruby. On 22 November 2002, police set up a road block near the spot where the body was found. Some 6,000 motorists in the area were questioned, but no leads were discovered. Initially the Surrey police had considered Dowler's father a suspect, as police have often found that family members are implicated in such cases. They later apologised for the missed opportunities their attention to this track may have caused. On 23 March 2003, DNA of an unidentified male was discovered on an item of Dowler's clothing in her bedroom, suggesting that her killer may have met her before. This link was ruled out within three months, at the same time that a DNA link to a church robbery in Sunderland was also ruled out. Paul Hughes was convicted of making threats to kill and was jailed for five years after sending letters to Dowler's sister threatening to kill her and claiming to have killed Dowler. Hughes sent the letters while imprisoned for indecently assaulting a twelve-year-old girl; the prison service apologised for not screening mail effectively. Lianne Newman, of Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, repeatedly phoned Dowler's parents, school and the police, pretending to be Dowler. Newman was jailed in April 2003 for five months after pleading guilty to five counts of making phone calls to cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety. Gary Farr, of Retford, Nottinghamshire, repeatedly e-mailed Dowler's parents, school friends and police officers working on the case, claiming that Dowler had been smuggled out of the country to work as a prostitute and stripper at nightclubs in Poland, and that her alleged death had been a cover-up. Farr was sectioned indefinitely under the Mental Health Act on 19 October 2006 for being a serious psychological danger to the public after admitting a charge of harassment. In March 2008, a man was arrested over the 'disposal' of a car linked to the murder investigation but he was released later that same day. On 4 August 2009, a 40-year-old man from west London was arrested in relation to the disposal of a red Daewoo Nexia, but later released without charge. Two months later, Bedfont Lakes Country Park in West London was searched by police in hope of finding the car, but they recovered neither the car nor anything else of interest to their inquiry. The car has yet to be found. On 25 February 2008, Surrey Police confirmed that Levi Bellfield was their prime suspect in the murder inquiry and that they were "very interested" in questioning him. On 30 March 2010, Bellfield was charged with Dowler's abduction and murder. As a result, the inquest into the death was adjourned. On 6 October 2010, Bellfield appeared in court via video link, as he was already serving three life sentences for murder and attempted murder. He was formally charged with one count of attempted abduction, one count of abduction, one count of disposal of evidence, and one count of murder. Trial of Bellfield: Bellfield's trial began on 10 May 2011 at the Central Criminal Court before Mr Justice Wilkie and concluded on 23 June 2011; the jury found him guilty. He was sentenced to life imprisonment the following day, and the trial judge recommended a whole-life tariff in line with his previous murder convictions three years earlier. The trial of Bellfield on another charge of attempted abduction, in the case of Rachel Cowles, an 11-year-old girl known to have been offered a lift in the Walton area by a man in a red car on 20 March 2002, was abandoned due to newspapers publishing prejudicial material. The judge ordered that the charge should remain on file. Post-trial: Following the trial of Bellfield, the murder of Dowler, investigation, and trial were the subject of a special Crimewatch programme, titled Taken: The Milly Dowler Story, which was broadcast on BBC One on 30 June 2011. It featured interviews with witnesses, the family, and investigators. It explored how Bellfield was caught. It also featured a reconstruction of what is believed to have occurred, based on court transcripts. On 27 January 2016, Surrey Police announced that Bellfield had admitted to the abduction, rape and murder of Dowler. This was after another arrest in the Dowler case had been made and Bellfield was interviewed about whether he had had an accomplice. After Bellfield's confession, the police released the individual they had arrested without charge. On 12 February 2016, Bellfield changed his story, denying that he had confessed to Dowler's murder. Reactions to court proceedings: After Bellfield's sentencing, the Dowler family strongly criticised their treatment during the trial. Dowler's sister Gemma described the day that her parents were cross-examined by Bellfield's defence lawyer as "the worst day of my life". Her mother told reporters outside the Old Bailey: For us, the trial has been a truly awful experience. We have had to hear Milly's name defamed in court; she has been portrayed as an unhappy, depressed young girl... the Milly we knew was a happy, vivacious, fun-loving girl. Our family life has been scrutinised and laid open for everyone to inspect. We've had to lose our right to privacy and sit through day after harrowing day of the trial in order to get a man convicted of this brutal murder. The lengths the system goes to protect his human rights seems so unfair compared to what we as a family have had to endure. Dowler's father, Bob, commented on Bellfield's refusal to give evidence in court, and to appear for sentencing. He added: My family's had to pay too high a price for this conviction. The trial has been a truly mentally-scarring experience on an unimaginable scale; you had to have been there to truly understand. During our questioning, my wife and I both felt as if we were on trial; we despair of a justice system that is so loaded in favour of the perpetrator of the crime. Chief Constable Mark Rowley, who oversaw the investigation, joined the Director of Public Prosecutions in calling for changes and for greater protection of victims and witnesses during court cases. Rowley said it was a "most bizarre and distressing coincidence" that the Dowler family had their privacy "destroyed", at a time when footballers and celebrities were being granted super-injunctions to protect details of their personal lives. Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke rejected calls for a review of criminal cases, saying "it is just an unfortunate anomaly in the application of a fair and balanced judicial system". Clarke said that, while Bellfield had been convicted of previous murders, he had to be presumed innocent in the Dowler case and found guilty by a jury in a full court process, and not presumed guilty. To avoid prejudicing the trial, the court did not allow evidence to be introduced of Bellfield's "obsession" with schoolgirls, and his attempts to procure sex from them. Voicemail tampering investigation: The Guardian reported on 4 July 2011 that Scotland Yard had discovered Dowler's voicemail had been accessed by journalists working for the News of the World and the newspaper's private investigator Glenn Mulcaire. The Guardian also reported that, during the police investigation into that newspaper's phone hacking activities, detectives discovered that journalists had deleted some messages—potential evidence—in Dowler's voicemail box because it was full, in order to free up space for new messages, to which they could listen. The deletions after Dowler was missing led family and friends to think that she was still alive. It was later reported that Dowler's phone automatically deleted messages 72 hours after they were listened to. Dowler's parents announced via their solicitor that they would pursue a claim for damages against the News of the World. In September 2011, it was reported that the Dowler family had been offered £2m in personal damages. In January 2012, it was reported that Surrey Police and other police forces knew soon after Dowler's death that News of the World staff had accessed her mobile phone messages, but did not take issue with this. Instead a senior Surrey officer invited newspaper staff to a meeting to discuss the case. Legacy: Dowler's parents, Sally and Bob Dowler, launched a charity called Milly's Fund on the day of her memorial service in October 2002. Its mission is "to promote public safety, and in particular the safety of the children and young people". The charity provides risk assessment advice to teenagers, youth workers, and educators. Its work includes the "Teach UR Mum 2 TXT" campaign, which encourages children and parents to stay in contact via text messaging, including a glossary for parents of commonly-used SMS abbreviations. The campaign was awarded "Best Use of Mobile for Accessibility" at the 2004 GSM Association Awards. Milly's Fund commissioned a five-part soap opera titled Watch Over Me (2003), which encourages personal safety for teenagers, to be distributed to every school in the UK. In 2005, the family announced that the charity would be transferred to the Suzy Lamplugh Trust. Milly's Fund was wound up that year. At the 2005 Hampton Court Palace Flower Show, a garden designed in memory of Dowler by Penny Smith won the Tudor Rose award, the show's highest honour. Its design was supported by the Surrey Police and Milly's Fund. A magenta sweetpea was named after Dowler and made publicly available by Matthewman's Sweetpeas. On 29 June 2017, Dowler's sister Gemma released a book dedicated to Dowler, titled My Sister Milly. The investigation that led to Bellfield's arrest was dramatised in the three-part 2019 television series Manhunt, with Martin Clunes playing Colin Sutton.

Karmein Chan

Karmein Chan was a 13-year-old Australian girl who was abducted from her home in Templestowe, Victoria, during the night of 13 April 1991 and was subsequently murdered. "Mr Cruel" is the prime suspect. Kidnapping: Chan was at home babysitting her two younger sisters while both her parents worked at a Chinese restaurant they owned in the nearby Melbourne suburb of Eltham. Chan and her sisters were confronted by a man in a balaclava with a knife. He forced Chan's sisters into a wardrobe before fleeing with Chan. Before leaving, he spray painted "Asian drug deal", "payback" and "more to come" on a vehicle in their front yard. Police suspect this was a ruse to distract them from the killer's real motive. Chan's mother made an emotional plea on television for Chan's return. Related events: There had been several abductions of girls in Melbourne prior to the abduction of Chan by an offender known in the media as Mr Cruel. Victoria Police had started scaling down Operation Challenge the day before Chan's abduction that had been established to investigate two abductions in which the victim was raped and an earlier home invasion also involving rape. Detectives believed that Chan would be released the same as previous girls abducted. Investigation: On 6 May 1991, 23 days after Chan's abduction, Victoria Police formed the Spectrum Taskforce to investigate Chan's abduction and to continue Operation Challenge investigations. A reward of $100,000 was offered for information on her abduction. On 9 April 1992, Chan's remains were found nearly a year later in a landfill area at Edgars Creek in the suburb of Thomastown. The skull had three bullet holes in the back of the head. The body had probably been there for 12 months. On 31 January 1994, the Spectrum Taskforce was disbanded. The offender was never brought to justice. A few detectives had doubts whether Chan was a Mr Cruel victim. Outcome: An inquest was held in 1997 with the coroner finding that she met her death through foul play, but it was not possible to identify the person or people responsible. The case has remained open with cold case detectives regularly reviewing the investigation. On the 25th anniversary of her abduction the reward was increased from $100,000 to $1,000,000.

little bit of everything

when i was at the LDS Christmas party i was told to take a little bit of every type of dessert as i was giving most of these to my brother. plus it was a good idea to have a little bit of everything so i took as many small desserts while leaving as much of what i could for everyone else. also i was given some of the dinner (Ham, green beans, mashed potatoes, rolls). it was awesome. i was offered more food. i'm like, "More food?" looking at what i already had, which was a lot already. i'm like, "no i'm good." took me the entire weekend to eat it all and save my mom from breaking her diet.

Disappearance of Relisha Rudd

Relisha Tenay Rudd is an 8-year old African-American girl who went missing in Washington, D.C. in February 2014, and has not been found. Rudd had been living in the D.C. General Shelter with her mother, when she was befriended by janitor Khalil Tatum, a former felon. Rudd stopped attending school, but it was a month before her absence was reported to police. Investigation revealed that the last sighting of her had been weeks prior when she was caught on camera with Tatum at an area hotel. Tatum's wife was found shot dead in a hotel in Prince George's County, Maryland in mid-March, and at the end of March, searchers found Tatum's body in a shed in the Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens, shot in an apparent suicide. The case of Relisha Rudd received little coverage outside of the Washington D.C. area, leading to criticism that her case receives little attention due to her marginalization as a person of color and from an impoverished family. Disappearance: In 2014, Rudd was living with her mother Shamika Young at the General Shelter. Khalil Tatum was a 51-year-old janitor at the shelter, and had a felony record for burglary, larceny, and breaking-and-entering. Tatum was imprisoned from 1993 to 2003, and again from 2004 to 2011. He was hired as a shelter janitor by the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, a contractor which operated the General Shelter and reportedly "other city homeless programs". Tatum was known for inappropriately fraternizing with shelter residents, and for paying particular attention to young girls. Tatum befriended Young, bought her daughter a tablet computer, and took her to see Disney on Ice. Eventually Young allowed Tatum to take the girl away overnight, allegedly to stay with him and his grandmother. Rudd suddenly stopped attending school in February, but her mother provided a note saying she was having health problems and was in the care of a "Dr. Tatum". The school contacted Tatum at the number provided, but when he failed to show up for a meeting with them, a counselor contacted the police to report Rudd missing. The Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia launched a missing-persons probe on 19 March, by which point Rudd had not been in school for a month. The investigation revealed that Tatum and Rudd had been caught on camera walking down a hallway in a Holiday Inn Express in Northeast, Washington, D.C. on 26 February, and footage on 1 March showed her walking with Tatum to a room in a Days Inn on New York Avenue in D.C. The March 1st footage proved to be the last proof that Rudd was still alive. Tatums' wife's death: Tatum's wife Andrea was found shot in the head in a motel in Prince George's County, Maryland on the same day Rudd was reported missing (March 20th). Surveillance tapes showed Kahlil and Andrea Tatum entering the hotel room the night before. Kahlil Tatum was last seen 2 March, the day after Rudd was last seen, while buying a shovel, lime, and 42-gallon trash bags. DC police obtained an arrest warrant for Kahlil Tatum in his wife's murder, but on 31 March, Tatum's body was found in a shed in Kenilworth Park, dead of apparent suicide, from the same gun that killed his wife. Steve Wilkos TV show: In October, 2017, Relisha's mother, Shamika Young; her stepfather, Antonio Wheeler; and her grandmother, Melissa Young appear on The Steve Wilkos TV show. In polygraph tests, they are asked "Did you participate in any way in the disappearance of Relisha?". Both the stepfather Antonio & the grandmother Melissa answer "No", and the polygraph results confirm that they were telling the truth. Relisha's mother Shamika refuses to take the polygraph test. Theories: There are a limited number of theories for what happened to Rudd, given Tatum's predatory behavior and violent murder-suicide shortly after her disappearance. Authorities generally believe that Rudd was either murdered by Tatum, or was sold to sex-traffickers. In an interview with The Washington Post, a senior law-enforcement official suspected that Tatum had been sexually exploiting Rudd, and possibly pimping her to others, and may have killed his wife due to her finding out about his activities.