Jackson Gave Jesus Juice To Other Kids

JANUARY 13--Two New Jersey children were served alcohol by Michael Jackson during an early-2003 visit to the singer's Neverland Ranch, according to police interviews with the California boy who has accused Jackson of sexual molestation.

The alleged victim, who has told investigators that Jackson also provided wine and liquor to him and his two siblings, mentioned the pair of New Jersey minors during an August 2003 interview with Santa Barbara detectives, according to sealed records reviewed by The Smoking Gun.

Documents and TSG sources identified the two children as siblings of Frank Cascio, a 24-year-old Jackson aide who prosecutors branded an unindicted co-conspirator in the entertainer's April 2004 criminal indictment. Cascio, who uses the name Frank Tyson, has been close to Jackson for nearly ten years, and was at Neverland during the early-2003 period when the accuser and his family claim they were held against their will. Cascio is pictured with Jackson in the above video still.

It was during that period of purported incarceration that the accuser and his family met Cascio's young relatives--a sister who is currently a high school sophomore in Bergen County, and a brother who is about 12 years old.

While answering a question about where at Neverland Jackson provided him alcohol, the accuser, now 15, remarked that "sometimes Michael would also give wine" to the New Jersey siblings when they all were in the estate's wine cellar, which is accessed via a hidden staircase in the Neverland game arcade. He added that Jackson's young drinking buddies would imbibe wine--which Jackson called "Jesus Juice"--straight from the bottle and sometimes from glasses.

The alleged victim told detectives that Cascio's little brother "would not always drink because he did not like it." Additionally, he told investigators that the New Jersey boy also slept with Jackson in his Neverland bedroom.

Joseph Tacopina, a lawyer for Frank Cascio, told TSG that Santa Barbara prosecutors have not sought to interview the New Jersey children about their Neverland stay. While Tacopina would not say whether the minors had spoken with Jackson's legal team, he did acknowledge that defense investigators had been desirous of interviewing the siblings.

According to police interviews with the accuser, his brother, and their mother, the New Jersey children were present at Neverland during a crucial moment in the prosecution's conspiracy timeline. It appears Cascio's siblings could provide a unique, first-person account of what transpired during that period (keeping in mind, of course, that their older brother has been accused of playing a leading role in the false imprisonment scheme).

Along with noting Jackson's alleged provision of wine to the New Jersey siblings, the accuser told detectives that Cascio's little brother slept in Jackson's bed with him and the 46-year-old entertainer. The accuser added that the New Jersey boy, Jackson, and the accuser's younger brother also shared the performer's bed.

So, even in the wake of the firestorm caused by the February 2003 broadcast of Martin Bashir's "Living with Michael Jackson" documentary, the performer was apparently still sleeping with three boys to whom he was not related.

In a July 2003 police interview, the accuser's mother recounted how, at one point during her family's Neverland imprisonment, she escaped one night with her children, "running in the dark through Neverland, being led by [Cascio's sister]" to find their way to the car.

That car, a black Rolls Royce, transported the family back to their home in Los Angeles and was driven by Jesus Salas, a Neverland security official. The mother claimed that she was forced to bolt from Neverland due to threats directed at her clan by, among others, Jackson's German managers, Dieter Wiesner and Ronald Konitzer.

She acknowledged returning with her children almost immediately, however, telling detectives that Frank Cascio told her that her family's life was in danger, and that they would be safer behind Neverland's wall. She also claimed that Jackson's aide assured her that Wiesner and Konitzer had been fired. Upon her family's return to Jackson's estate, the mother told investigators, the first people she encountered were the two Germans, who were still working for the entertainer.