Wade Robson and James Safechuck, the men who accused Michael Jackson of molesting them will be able to sue Michael Jackson’s companies.
A California appeals court on Friday revived the lawsuits after a judge dismissed the case in 2021.
Wade Robson, one of the subjects of the 2019 HBO documentary “Leaving Neverland,” first filed the lawsuit in 2013.
Robson alleges that Michael Jackson began sexually abusing him when he was 7 years old,
The suit was first dismissed on statute of limitations grounds but was revived in 2020 after California amended its state law to give plaintiffs in child sex abuse cases more time to sue.
Both Robson, 46, and Safechuck, 40, are suing MJJ Productions Inc. and MJJ Ventures Inc., owned by Jackson at the time of his death in 2009.
The men allege that Jackson’s businesses had a “duty of care” and that employees of those business entities acted as “co-conspirators, collaborators, facilitators and alter egos.”
“Plaintiffs had every right to expect defendants to protect them from the entirely foreseeable danger of being left alone with Jackson,” the judges wrote in their decision.
“We are disappointed with the Court’s decision. Two distinguished trial judges repeatedly dismissed these cases on numerous occasions over the last decade because the law required it. We remain fully confident that Michael is innocent of these allegations, which are contrary to all credible evidence and independent corroboration, and which were only first made years after Michael’s death. We trust that the truth will ultimately prevail with Michael’s vindication yet again. Michael Jackson himself said, ‘lies run sprints, but the truth runs marathons,'” says Jonathan Steinsapir, attorney for the Estate of Michael Jackson.
Credit: Variety, Huffington Post, ABC, New York Times