Jackson attorneys want indictment thrown out
LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Singer Michael Jackson's defense team has come out swinging against the Santa Barbara District Attorney's Office in an all-out effort to get the grand jury indictment against the singer thrown out.
In a 47-page motion filed Tuesday and released Wednesday by the Santa Barbara Superior Court, Jackson attorney Robert Sanger called April's grand jury proceeding "remarkable" and claims the prosecution "ran the proceedings as if they employed the grand jurors" and "sabotaged the grand jury's ability to perform its function."
The defense motion said the prosecution "poisoned the entire proceeding with highly inflammatory and prejudicial testimony" against their client, and asked that the indictment be set aside.
In a court appearance April 30, Jackson pleaded not guilty to a grand jury indictment of 10 charges -- including four counts of child molestation, four counts of administering an intoxicating agent, one count of attempted child molestation and one count of conspiracy to commit child abduction, false imprisonment and extortion.
The heavily redacted defense filing accused the prosecution of "an outrageous display of power" that is "... a paradigm of what a prosecutor is not allowed to do behind closed doors."
It also asked the judge "to protect Mr. Jackson from an overzealous prosecutor," Thomas Sneddon.
Sanger wrote that the district attorneys "bullied and argued with witnesses," "allowed extremely prejudicial material to freely come before the grand jurors," "gave short shrift to the law," "vouched for their version of facts over that of sworn witnesses" and "argued improper inferences."
The defense lawyer alleges that in returning an indictment against the entertainer, "grand jurors succumbed to their (the prosecution's) influences."
"The prosecution abused its power and violated its duty to go into the grand jury room and present the evidence fairly and accurately," Sanger wrote.
The defense team motion also accused the prosecution of improperly presenting "exculpatory materials provided by defense counsel" to the grand jury.
"So much of the evidence presented to the grand jurors was 'blacked out' that it prompted one of the grand jurors to ask the prosecution, 'Did you guys get any sleep over the weekend?'" Sanger wrote.
The motion claimed that the charge of conspiracy against Jackson is derived from inadmissible evidence, or no evidence at all.
"Nothing presented to the grand jury established that Mr. Jackson had the intent to commit the elements of the alleged conspiracy's three target crimes of false imprisonment, child abduction and extortion," Sanger wrote.
The defense motion is based on a review of the grand jury transcript and gives insight not only into the immense size of the recording -- 1,900 pages contained in eight volumes -- but also into witness testimony before the panel.
The defense said the prosecution team allowed witnesses to "prejudice" the grand jury with "impassioned and prejudicial remarks."
In one instance, the defense motion cited a female witness calling Jackson "the devil" and saying that she would not take "the devil's money."
In another, an unidentified witness told of "wild tales of 'killers' and secret conversations in 'code.'"
Sneddon is also accused of treating prosecution witnesses with a "'kid gloves' approach designed to bolster his credibility" while other witnesses "would be treated as hostile" and subjected "to improper cross-examination style questioning."
The defense motion claimed prosecutors ran the grand jury.
"The grand jurors believed that they had to ask the prosecutors for permission to use the restroom," Sanger wrote.
The prosecution's reply to the defense motion was ordered sealed Wednesday.
Attorneys will be in court this coming Friday to argue the matter.
Jackson is not expected to attend.
