Shadowfax
10-17-2011, 05:56 PM
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-thomson/one-of-the-most-shameful_b_610258.html
Et Utdrag:
When the jury delivered 14 'not guilty' verdicts, the media was 'humiliated', Mesereau said in a subsequent interview. Media analyst Tim Rutten later commented, "So what happened when Jackson was acquitted on all counts? Red faces? Second thoughts? A little soul-searching, perhaps? Maybe one expression of regret for the rush to judgment? Naaawww. The reaction, instead, was rage liberally laced with contempt and the odd puzzled expression. Its targets were the jurors... Hell hath no fury like a cable anchor held up for scorn."
In a post-verdict news conference Sneddon continued to refer to Gavin Arvizo as a 'victim' and said he suspected that the 'celebrity factor' had impeded the jury's judgment - a line many media pundits swiftly appropriated as they set about undermining the jurors and their verdicts.
Within minutes of the announcement, Nancy Grace appeared on CourtTV to allege that jurors had been seduced by Jackson's fame and bizarrely claim that the prosecution's only weak link had been Janet Arvizo.
"I'm having a crow sandwich right now," she said. "It doesn't taste very good. But you know what? I'm also not surprised. I thought that celebrity is such a big factor. When you think you know somebody, when you have watched their concerts, listened to their records, read the lyrics, believed they were coming from somebody's heart... Jackson is very charismatic, although he never took the stand. That has an effect on this jury.
"I'm not gonna throw a stone at the mom, although I think she was the weak link in the state's case, but the reality is I'm not surprised. I thought that the jury would vote in favor of the similar transaction witnesses. Apparently the defense overwhelmed them with the cross-examining of the mother. I think it boils down to that, plain and simple."
Grace later stated that Jackson was 'not guilty by reason of celebrity' and was seen attempting to hound jury foreman Paul Rodriguez into saying he believed Jackson had molested children. One of Grace's guests, psychoanalyst Bethany Marshall, leveled personal attacks towards one female juror, saying, "This is a woman who has no life."
Over on Fox News, Wendy Murphy branded Jackson 'the Teflon molester' and said that the jurors needed IQ tests. She later added, "I really think it's the celebrity factor, not the evidence. I don't think the jurors even understand how influenced they were by who Michael Jackson is... They basically put targets on the backs of all, especially highly vulnerable, kids that will now come into Michael Jackson's life."
Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin told CNN that he thought the 'prior bad acts' testimony had been 'effective evidence', even though various boys at the heart of that testimony had taken the stand as defense witnesses and denied ever being molested. He also claimed that the defense had won because "they could tell a story, and juries, you know, always understand stories rather than sort of individual facts."
Only Robert Shapiro was dignified in the face of the verdicts, telling viewers that they should accept the jurors' decision because the jurors were from "a very conservative part of California and if they had no doubt, none of us should have any doubt."
The following day on Good Morning America, Diane Sawyer upheld the notion that the verdict had been influenced by Jackson's celebrity status. "Are you sure?" she pleaded. "Are you sure that this gigantically renowned guy walking into the room had no influence at all?"
The Washington Post commented, "An acquittal doesn't clear his name, it only muddies the water." Both the New York Post and the New York Daily News ran with the snide headline 'Boy, Oh, Boy!'
In her final New York Post article about the trial, Diane Dimond bemoaned the not guilty verdict, saying that it left Michael Jackson untouchable. She wrote, "He walked out of court a free man, not guilty on all counts. But Michael Jackson is so much more than free. He now has carte blanche to live his life any way he wants, with whomever he wants, because who would ever try to prosecute Michael Jackson now?"
In Britain's Sun newspaper, celebrity rent-a-gob and talking head extraordinaire Jane Moore penned an article titled 'If the jury agree Janet Arvizo is a bad mum (and she IS)... How did they let Jackson off?' It began: "Michael Jackson is innocent. Justice has been done. Or so the loony tunes gathered outside the courthouse would have us believe." She went on to question the jurors' mental capacity and dismiss the American legal system as 'half-baked'. "Nothing and no one truly emerges as a winner from this sorry mess," she finished, "least of all what they laughably call American 'justice'."
Sun contributor Ally Ross dismissed Jackson's fans as 'sad, solitary dick-wits'. Another Sun article, penned by daytime TV presenter Lorraine Kelly, titled 'Don't forget the kids still at risk... Jacko's own', overtly labeled Jackson a guilty man. Kelly - who never attended Jackson's trial - bemoaned the fact that Jackson 'got away with it', complaining that "instead of languishing in jail, Jackson is now back home in Neverland." Jackson, she concluded, was "a sad, sick loser who uses his fame and money to dazzle the parents of children he takes a shine to."
After the initial outrage, the Michael Jackson story slipped out of the headlines. There was little analysis of the not guilty verdicts and how they were reached. An acquittal was considered less profitable than a conviction.
Indeed, Thomas Mesereau said in later years that if Jackson had been convicted it would have created a 'cottage industry' for the media, generating a story a day for years to come. Long-running sagas like custody of Jackson's children, control of his financial empire, other 'victims' filing civil suits and the long-winded appeals process would have generated thousands of stories each for months, years, perhaps even decades.
Jackson's imprisonment would have created a never ending supply of gratuitous headlines; Who is visiting? Who isn't? Is he in solitary confinement? If not, who are his cellmates? What about his prison wardens? Does he have a prison pen-pal girlfriend? Can we fly a helicopter over the prison yard and film him exercising? The possibilities were endless. A bidding war was raging over who would get the first leaked images of Jackson in his cell before the jury even began its deliberations.
A not guilty verdict was not quite so lucrative. In an interview with Newsweek, CNN boss Jonathan Klein recalled watching the not guilty verdicts come in and then telling his deputies, "We have a less interesting story now." The Hollywood Reporter noted that hastily assembled TV specials about Jackson's acquittal performed badly and were beaten in the ratings by a re-run of Nanny 911.
The story was over. There were no apologies and no retractions. There was no scrutiny - no inquiries or investigations. Nobody was held to account for what was done to Michael Jackson. The media was content to let people go on believing their heavily skewed and borderline fictitious account of the trial. That was that.
When Michael Jackson died the media went into overdrive again. What drugs had killed him? How long had he been using them? Who had prescribed them? What else was in his system? How much did he weigh?
But there was one question nobody seemed to want to ask: Why?
Why was Michael Jackson so stressed and so paranoid that he couldn't even get a decent night's sleep unless somebody stuck a tube full of anesthetic into his arm? I think the answer can be found in the results of various polls conducted in the wake of Michael Jackson's trial.
A poll conducted by Gallup in the hours after the verdict showed that 54% of White Americans and 48% of the overall population disagreed with the jury's decision of 'not guilty'. The poll also found that 62% of people felt Jackson's celebrity status was instrumental in the verdicts. 34% said they were 'saddened' by the verdict and 24% said they were 'outraged'. In a Fox News poll 37% of voters said the verdict was 'wrong' while an additional 25% said 'celebrities buy justice'. A poll by People Weekly found that a staggering 88% of readers disagreed with the jury's decision.
The media did a number on its audience and it did a number on Jackson. After battling his way through an exhausting and horrifying trial, riddled with hideous accusations and character assassinations, Michael Jackson should have felt vindicated when the jury delivered 14 unanimous not guilty verdicts. But the media's irresponsible coverage of the trial made it impossible for Jackson to ever feel truly vindicated. The legal system may have declared him innocent but the public, on the whole, still thought otherwise. Allegations which were disproven in court went unchallenged in the press. Shaky testimony was presented as fact. The defense's case was all but ignored.
When asked about those who doubted the verdicts, the jury replied, "They didn't see what we saw."
They're right. We didn't. But we should have done. And those who refused to tell us remain in their jobs unchecked, unpunished and free to do exactly the same thing to anybody they desire.
Now that's what I call injustice.
Et Utdrag:
When the jury delivered 14 'not guilty' verdicts, the media was 'humiliated', Mesereau said in a subsequent interview. Media analyst Tim Rutten later commented, "So what happened when Jackson was acquitted on all counts? Red faces? Second thoughts? A little soul-searching, perhaps? Maybe one expression of regret for the rush to judgment? Naaawww. The reaction, instead, was rage liberally laced with contempt and the odd puzzled expression. Its targets were the jurors... Hell hath no fury like a cable anchor held up for scorn."
In a post-verdict news conference Sneddon continued to refer to Gavin Arvizo as a 'victim' and said he suspected that the 'celebrity factor' had impeded the jury's judgment - a line many media pundits swiftly appropriated as they set about undermining the jurors and their verdicts.
Within minutes of the announcement, Nancy Grace appeared on CourtTV to allege that jurors had been seduced by Jackson's fame and bizarrely claim that the prosecution's only weak link had been Janet Arvizo.
"I'm having a crow sandwich right now," she said. "It doesn't taste very good. But you know what? I'm also not surprised. I thought that celebrity is such a big factor. When you think you know somebody, when you have watched their concerts, listened to their records, read the lyrics, believed they were coming from somebody's heart... Jackson is very charismatic, although he never took the stand. That has an effect on this jury.
"I'm not gonna throw a stone at the mom, although I think she was the weak link in the state's case, but the reality is I'm not surprised. I thought that the jury would vote in favor of the similar transaction witnesses. Apparently the defense overwhelmed them with the cross-examining of the mother. I think it boils down to that, plain and simple."
Grace later stated that Jackson was 'not guilty by reason of celebrity' and was seen attempting to hound jury foreman Paul Rodriguez into saying he believed Jackson had molested children. One of Grace's guests, psychoanalyst Bethany Marshall, leveled personal attacks towards one female juror, saying, "This is a woman who has no life."
Over on Fox News, Wendy Murphy branded Jackson 'the Teflon molester' and said that the jurors needed IQ tests. She later added, "I really think it's the celebrity factor, not the evidence. I don't think the jurors even understand how influenced they were by who Michael Jackson is... They basically put targets on the backs of all, especially highly vulnerable, kids that will now come into Michael Jackson's life."
Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin told CNN that he thought the 'prior bad acts' testimony had been 'effective evidence', even though various boys at the heart of that testimony had taken the stand as defense witnesses and denied ever being molested. He also claimed that the defense had won because "they could tell a story, and juries, you know, always understand stories rather than sort of individual facts."
Only Robert Shapiro was dignified in the face of the verdicts, telling viewers that they should accept the jurors' decision because the jurors were from "a very conservative part of California and if they had no doubt, none of us should have any doubt."
The following day on Good Morning America, Diane Sawyer upheld the notion that the verdict had been influenced by Jackson's celebrity status. "Are you sure?" she pleaded. "Are you sure that this gigantically renowned guy walking into the room had no influence at all?"
The Washington Post commented, "An acquittal doesn't clear his name, it only muddies the water." Both the New York Post and the New York Daily News ran with the snide headline 'Boy, Oh, Boy!'
In her final New York Post article about the trial, Diane Dimond bemoaned the not guilty verdict, saying that it left Michael Jackson untouchable. She wrote, "He walked out of court a free man, not guilty on all counts. But Michael Jackson is so much more than free. He now has carte blanche to live his life any way he wants, with whomever he wants, because who would ever try to prosecute Michael Jackson now?"
In Britain's Sun newspaper, celebrity rent-a-gob and talking head extraordinaire Jane Moore penned an article titled 'If the jury agree Janet Arvizo is a bad mum (and she IS)... How did they let Jackson off?' It began: "Michael Jackson is innocent. Justice has been done. Or so the loony tunes gathered outside the courthouse would have us believe." She went on to question the jurors' mental capacity and dismiss the American legal system as 'half-baked'. "Nothing and no one truly emerges as a winner from this sorry mess," she finished, "least of all what they laughably call American 'justice'."
Sun contributor Ally Ross dismissed Jackson's fans as 'sad, solitary dick-wits'. Another Sun article, penned by daytime TV presenter Lorraine Kelly, titled 'Don't forget the kids still at risk... Jacko's own', overtly labeled Jackson a guilty man. Kelly - who never attended Jackson's trial - bemoaned the fact that Jackson 'got away with it', complaining that "instead of languishing in jail, Jackson is now back home in Neverland." Jackson, she concluded, was "a sad, sick loser who uses his fame and money to dazzle the parents of children he takes a shine to."
After the initial outrage, the Michael Jackson story slipped out of the headlines. There was little analysis of the not guilty verdicts and how they were reached. An acquittal was considered less profitable than a conviction.
Indeed, Thomas Mesereau said in later years that if Jackson had been convicted it would have created a 'cottage industry' for the media, generating a story a day for years to come. Long-running sagas like custody of Jackson's children, control of his financial empire, other 'victims' filing civil suits and the long-winded appeals process would have generated thousands of stories each for months, years, perhaps even decades.
Jackson's imprisonment would have created a never ending supply of gratuitous headlines; Who is visiting? Who isn't? Is he in solitary confinement? If not, who are his cellmates? What about his prison wardens? Does he have a prison pen-pal girlfriend? Can we fly a helicopter over the prison yard and film him exercising? The possibilities were endless. A bidding war was raging over who would get the first leaked images of Jackson in his cell before the jury even began its deliberations.
A not guilty verdict was not quite so lucrative. In an interview with Newsweek, CNN boss Jonathan Klein recalled watching the not guilty verdicts come in and then telling his deputies, "We have a less interesting story now." The Hollywood Reporter noted that hastily assembled TV specials about Jackson's acquittal performed badly and were beaten in the ratings by a re-run of Nanny 911.
The story was over. There were no apologies and no retractions. There was no scrutiny - no inquiries or investigations. Nobody was held to account for what was done to Michael Jackson. The media was content to let people go on believing their heavily skewed and borderline fictitious account of the trial. That was that.
When Michael Jackson died the media went into overdrive again. What drugs had killed him? How long had he been using them? Who had prescribed them? What else was in his system? How much did he weigh?
But there was one question nobody seemed to want to ask: Why?
Why was Michael Jackson so stressed and so paranoid that he couldn't even get a decent night's sleep unless somebody stuck a tube full of anesthetic into his arm? I think the answer can be found in the results of various polls conducted in the wake of Michael Jackson's trial.
A poll conducted by Gallup in the hours after the verdict showed that 54% of White Americans and 48% of the overall population disagreed with the jury's decision of 'not guilty'. The poll also found that 62% of people felt Jackson's celebrity status was instrumental in the verdicts. 34% said they were 'saddened' by the verdict and 24% said they were 'outraged'. In a Fox News poll 37% of voters said the verdict was 'wrong' while an additional 25% said 'celebrities buy justice'. A poll by People Weekly found that a staggering 88% of readers disagreed with the jury's decision.
The media did a number on its audience and it did a number on Jackson. After battling his way through an exhausting and horrifying trial, riddled with hideous accusations and character assassinations, Michael Jackson should have felt vindicated when the jury delivered 14 unanimous not guilty verdicts. But the media's irresponsible coverage of the trial made it impossible for Jackson to ever feel truly vindicated. The legal system may have declared him innocent but the public, on the whole, still thought otherwise. Allegations which were disproven in court went unchallenged in the press. Shaky testimony was presented as fact. The defense's case was all but ignored.
When asked about those who doubted the verdicts, the jury replied, "They didn't see what we saw."
They're right. We didn't. But we should have done. And those who refused to tell us remain in their jobs unchecked, unpunished and free to do exactly the same thing to anybody they desire.
Now that's what I call injustice.