PLS READ CAREFULLY --TAKEN from MichaelJackson.com forum discussion

Quote by Ethemer from a previous discussion:

Michael's letter firing Branca and turning his legal affairs over to David LeGrand was dated February 2003.

It was in February 2003, while impaired by prescription medications, that Michael had signed over power of attorney to his manager Dieter Wiesner.

Wiesner’s plan was to bring in a new team to represent Michael. Part of that process involved terminating some of the representation of people that had been providing legal service to him.

LeGrand testified that Konitzer and Wiesner told him they wanted to take over overall management of Michael Jackson’s business and financial affairs, and implement a new business plan for Michael.


That’s when LeGrand became suspicious of the actions and motives of Wiesner and aides Ronald Konitzer (who had ties with Sony as became clear in the 2005 trial) and Marc Schaffel.


He also suspected the men of stealing $965.000 from Michael. On behalf of Michael he hired a firm to investigate these three men. The first investigative report that he got just increased his degree of suspicion.


In the meantime Konitzer and Schaffel had indicated in several conversations that they were suspicious about Branca and that Michael had expressed concern about Branca’s loyalty. They were concerned Branca was working with Tommy Motolla to get Michael’s interest in the ATV/Sony Catalogue and to defraud him.

There were suspicions about Branca self-dealing and about an off-shore account owned by Branca and Motolla.
 Even though LeGrand wasn’t sure about these accusations and was already suspicious about Konitzer, Schaffel and Wiesner, he decided to include Branca and Motolla in his investigation.
 The investigation delivered no evidence whatsoever to substantiate the claims against Branca and Motolla. In fact it became clear that it was Konitzer who had ties with Sony and both he and Weisner were stealing money from MJ.

LeGrand was fired (just 2 months after he was hired) when he questioned Konitzer about the unexplained disbursement of nearly $1 million of Michael's money to Konitzer and Weisner.


LeGrand’s testimony in court: “Mr. Branca’s a fine lawyer. And, you know, there is no -- I have no proof of these statements.
I was given no credible evidence to support those charges. I would be doing Mr. Branca and Mr. Motolla a great wrong if I said otherwise.”

Mesereau’s opening statement in court: “David LeGrand began to smell that something was wrong, and he confronted Dieter and Konitzer with his suspicions, even writing to them and saying, “Why are you withdrawing money. Who told you to do that. Who gave you permission. Where’s it going. What are you doing with it.”
They then were able to convince Michael Jackson to fire LeGrand. But before that happened, David LeGrand commenced an investigation into the activities of these alleged co-conspirators, Dieter, Konitzer, Schaffel and others. He hired a 1 top-flight investigative firm in New York to check out their backgrounds, to check out what they were doing, to see if they were hiding things overseas, to see if Mr. Jackson was being, as he said, defrauded, and to see if they were engaging in acts as what he described as self-dealing. But they were able to get to Michael and stop the investigation by getting him to fire LeGrand, because they convinced him that LeGrand was doing something wrong.
Marc Schaffel, the prosecutor told you that Mr. Jackson was a partner in his business. We will prove to you he was never a partner in his business. Marc Schaffel was a film producer who had met Mr. Jackson in the early ‘90s. And at one point Mr. Jackson said he wanted nothing to do with him. That was in writing from his attorneys.”

Schaffel later went on to file a $3.8 million lawsuit (later reduced to $1.6 million and his attorney ultimately asked the jury for $1.4 million) against Michael, claiming he was owed that amount for loans MJ took from him, and for work Michael hired him to do, but was never paid for.
Michael claimed that Schaffel, who controlled the bank accounts into which millions of dollars of his money was placed, owed him $660,000 in funds removed from an expense account for unreleased charity single, "What More Can I Give," before Schaffel was fired in November 2001 in response to Michael being shown a video of Schaffel directing gay porn. Schaffel was awarded $900,000 and Michael $200,000.
Wiesner filed a $64 million dollar fraud and breach-of-contract lawsuit against Michael but the lawsuit was dismissed.

Quote by Ethemer from a previous discussion:

The next day after filing the suit, Wiesner (the guy in control when Branca was fired) released voicemail tapes to the media of Michael making a slurred and forced sounding anti-Semitic comment, which got him in trouble with the Anti-Defamation League. In a taped deposition for the Wiesner suit (which you can find on YouTube) Michael stated that he was impaired by prescription medication when he signed over all his business and financial affairs to the control of Wiesner in February 2003 and for the next several months of that year. So, Branca was fired when his embezzling aides were in control of all of Michael's affairs.

LeGrand was fired when he discovered and confronted these aides who were stealing from Michael. Why is Branca the bad guy here?

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