LOS ANGELES – The temporary administrators of Michael Jackson’s estate have recovered $5.5 million and substantial amounts of personal property from an unnamed former financial adviser, and predict that the pop icon’s estate will be solvent despite an estimated $400 million or more in debt, according to court documents released Friday.
Attorney John Branca and music executive John McClain are serving as temporary administrators as spelled out in the King of Pop’s will. The men are finishing several deals that they expect will generate “tens of millions of dollars of revenues.”
They expect to submit those deals for court approval within the next week, the filings state.
The revelations were included in two motions requesting allowances for Jackson’s three children and his mother, Katherine. The petitions state that Jackson was the primary source of income for his children and his mother, who receives some money from Social Security.
Katherine Jackson currently has custody of the three children, 12-year-old Michael Joseph Jr., known as Prince Michael; 11-year-old Paris Michael Katherine Jackson; and 7-year-old Prince Michael II, known as Blanket. The children and Jackson’s mother are the only members of Jackson’s family eligible to receive support from the estate, according to the court filings.
The monthly stipends that Branca and McClain hope to provide the Jacksons are redacted from the court records released Friday.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff refused to grant the allowances on Thursday, opting instead to consider them at a hearing on Aug. 3. The judge did allow the administrators to enter into deals that will bring reprints of Michael Jackson’s 1988 autobiography, “Moonwalk” back to booksellers.
Branca and McClain “believe that the projected cash flow and the assets of the estate are more than sufficient to cover the payment of this of this amount as a family allowance for the benefit of the minor children.”
Jackson paid for the expenses at the Jackson family home in the San Fernando Valley, the court filings state. The administrators plan to keep that arrangement, even though some of the expenses may go to other Jackson family members who also live at the home.
Jackson’s children will receive Social Security benefits, which have been applied for but payments have not yet started. Their monthly stipends from the estate may be reduced, depending on much money they receive from Social Security, the filings state.
