Michael Jackson’s 2005 child sex abuse trial is the subject of a three-part docuseries coming to Netflix on June 3. New interviews with courtroom eyewitnesses, such as jurors and observers from the media, will anchor the recap of the case, which resulted in an acquittal after more than four months in court. Watch a trailer for Michael Jackson: The Verdict below.
The People v. Jackson trial, held in Santa Maria, California, was the only time Jackson went to court to contest the allegations that had circled him for more than a decade. Prosecutors primarily focused on the account of a young cancer patient named Gavin Arvizo, whom the British journalist Martin Bashir had interviewed about his experiences with Jackson in the bombshell 2003 documentary Living With Michael Jackson. Jackson faced a sentence of up to 20 years in prison if found guilty.
In May 2005, Jackson was acquitted on all seven counts of child molestation and both counts of giving a minor intoxicating liquor. In the years after his death, more people came forward with allegations of child sex abuse, including James Safechuck and Wade Robson, whose testimonies were at the center of the 2019 documentary Leaving Neverland. Both men continue to pursue claims agains Jackson’s company MJJ Productions. This year, five siblings who grew up in Jackson’s orbit sued his estate over their alleged grooming by the singer in their childhood. The allegations were notably absent from this year’s highly contentious, blockbuster biopic Michael.
