Michael Jackson Tried to Adopt Brazilian Babies

Monday, July 10, 2006

By Roger Friedman

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Michael Jackson tried to adopt two babies in Brazil in 2002 and 2003. At first he wanted two boys, then a boy and a girl. “He couldn’t make up his mind,” says a source. “He was also looking at 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds.”

A taped phone message not yet played in court is said to reveal Jackson telling an associate: “Get me two boys, no, get me a girl and a boy.” Says one source, “It sounds like someone asking you to run down to the store and get ice cream.”

Jackson used former associate Marc Schaffel — who’s now suing him in Santa Monica for $3.8 million — to set up the transactions. Contrary to Jackson’s story that he cut off relations with Schaffel when Jackson was told he was a producer/director of gay pornography, the associate never stopped working for him at all. He just changed his job description.

The $300,000 secret payment that I told you about last week was going to be used for this adoption. When that didn’t work out, the money (already in Brazil) was subsequently used to buy the continued silence of a family Jackson had quietly paid off years earlier when they claimed he’d had inappropriate relations with their son.

After Jackson was arrested for child molestation in November 2003, the family in question split for South America to escape being interviewed by Santa Barbara police detectives, then called and asked for additional funds.

What’s happening here is that Jackson’s lawyers, in their zeal to destroy Schaffel’s reputation, are exposing more of Jackson’s secrets.

In fact, it may yet come out in court that Jackson knew from the time he met Schaffel about his career in gay porno, my sources say.

I am told that Jackson was well aware of it long before his lawyers showed him tape of Schaffel directing an adult video.

It was also revealed in court last year, during his child molestation trial, that Jackson had in his possession a great deal of gay pornography, which he claimed fans sent to him.

The Brazilian adoption scheme came to fruition in 2002, sources say, when Schaffel hired a Miami immigration lawyer for Jackson. The female attorney, who knew she was working for Jackson, was Brazilian and had roots in the adoption community there.

It’s not clear whether Jackson’s current attorneys even know this happened. But Schaffel, having been temporarily sidelined as a music producer by Jackson in 2002, was sent on this mission instead.

The search for a willing orphanage and the right children went on through most of 2002, until Jackson, Schaffel, manager Dieter Wiesner and Jackson’s children — including the then-recently adopted “Blanket” — went to Germany for Jackson to accept a Bambi award.

It was there that Jackson infamously dangled Blanket out of a hotel window. Schaffel was in the room next door, debunking the theory that he and Jackson had parted ways months earlier.

Schaffel and Jackson’s plans for the adoption were derailed in early 2003, when Martin Bashir’s documentary aired on television, and the Arvizo family infamously came to stay at Neverland.

Schaffel then produced two rebuttal films for Jackson in February 2003, as well as handled the Arvizos' comings and goings.

When the family was finally jettisoned by all concerned in March, Schaffel revived the search. But it ended in November 2003 when Jackson was arrested on charges of child molestation and conspiracy. He was acquitted in June 2005.

There’s more to this story, and it only gets worse. The reason all this is coming out, of course, is because the Schaffel v. Jackson trial continues without a settlement. The reason for this can be only one of two things: Jackson is either getting the worst advice ever from lawyers, who are also billing him at top dollar, or he simply doesn’t have the cash on hand to settle the case.

My guess is it’s both, and before this trial is over, Michael Jackson’s reputation will be even more thoroughly damaged than it was last year.