{"id":318883,"date":"2026-03-08T08:11:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-08T08:11:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/318883\/"},"modified":"2026-03-08T08:11:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T08:11:15","slug":"michael-jacksons-company-scores-legal-victory-forces-accusers-to-battle-in-private-forum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/318883\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Jackson’s Company Scores Legal Victory, Forces Accusers to Battle in Private Forum"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Michael Jackson<\/a> Company won a major legal battle this week … because a judge has ordered a civil case — centered around alleged sex trafficking — be handled out of court and in a private setting<\/p>\n

Remember … Frank Cascio and his siblings — former family friends of the late pop star — are suing his estate<\/a> for more than $200 million, alleging they were victims of child sex trafficking by Jackson in the 1980s.<\/p>\n

\"Getty\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Remembering Michael Jackson – Click image to open gallery<\/p>\n

The siblings previously came to a settlement agreement with the Jackson estate … and, as part of that settlement, the judge found Cascio and company signed off on handling disputes like this in private arbitration, as opposed to the public court system.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

This is a big win for The Michael Jackson Company … which avoids the messiness of public court hearings and a possible trial as they deal with the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\"TMZ\"<\/p>\n

TMZ<\/p>\n

The Cascios have been engaged in legal turmoil with Jackson’s estate for a long time … even flying into Los Angeles to attend a hearing in January.<\/p>\n

While their attorneys — Howard King and Mark Geragos<\/a> — told us they deserve every penny they’re asking for, the Jackson estate’s lawyer Marty Singer<\/a> called the suit a “desperate money grab” by the Cascios.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Michael Jackson Company won a major legal battle this week … because a judge has ordered a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[172589,156,171840,6455,157,111,139,69,172591,172590],"class_list":["post-318883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-child-sex-trafficking","tag-entertainment","tag-frank-cascio","tag-michael-jackson","tag-music","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-private-arbitration","tag-sex-trafficking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}