It’s been five years since Michael Jackson died, yet his career is more alive than it had been in decades.
Just last month, the singer moonwalked across a Las Vegas stage in a nationally televised hologram performance. A new album recently debuted at No 2 in the charts. And a travelling Cirque du Soleil show based on Jackson’s songs has logged nearly 500 performances worldwide.
The result has been an estate that has earned more than US$600 million (Dh2.20 billion) since the King of Pop’s untimely death at age 50.
As would be expected, the past five years have brought their share of change and adjustment for Jackson’s children, known to the world as Prince, 17; Paris, 16; and Blanket, 12. They were at their father’s rented mansion on June 25, 2009, when he was given an overdose of the anaesthetic propofol in his upstairs bedroom, and the hospital several hours later when he was pronounced dead. It would take more than two years before Jackson’s doctor was convicted of involuntary manslaughter.
Prince testified about his father’s influence on the children, but Paris was hospitalised during the trial after authorities responded to a 911 call made because the teenager had cut herself with a knife and taken pills.
Lawyers and family members, including T J Jackson (a co-guardian of the singer’s three children), have said she is fine, but offered no further details. According to relatives, Paris took her father’s death the hardest.
The father who taught his children philanthropy, threw them lavish birthday parties and meticulously masked them from the paparazzi is gone. Michael Jackson, however, continues to provide.
Nearly $20m was spent to support Jackson’s children and his mother, Katherine, through 2012. Adulthood will bring a sizeable inheritance for each child.
In the meantime, lawyers have busily untangled Jackson’s finances. Among the more than $137m in disbursements between mid-2009 and the end of 2012, $45m was paid to the federal government for taxes.
Jackson’s children live with their grandmother in the celebrity enclave of Calabasas. The estate pays for private schools and tutors, a chef, private security and family holidays.
“Michael’s number one priority was his children, not wealth or fame,” said Tom Mesereau, the lawyer who successfully defended Jackson against child molestation charges and stays in touch with his family.
“He wanted them to get the best education possible,” Mesereau said. “He wanted them to be worldly.”
artslife@thenational.ae
Stage 5 results
1 Tadej Pogacar (SLO) UAE Team Emirates 3:48:53
2 Alexey Lutsenko (KAZ) Astana Pro Team -
3 Adam Yates (GBR) Mitchelton-Scott -
4 David Gaudu (FRA) Groupama-FDJ 0:00:04
5 Ilnur Zakarin (RUS) CCC Team 0:00:07
General Classification:
1 Adam Yates (GBR) Mitchelton-Scott 20:35:04
2 Tadej Pogacar (SlO) UAE Team Emirates 0:01:01
3 Alexey Lutsenko (KAZ) Astana Pro Team 0:01:33
4 David Gaudu (FRA) Groupama-FDJ 0:01:48
5 Rafał Majka (POL) Bora-Hansgrohe 0:02:11
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
