Posted by Excerpts:
This case is deceptively simple. Stripped to its essentials, it is an accounting case, albit one with an overlay of fraud, deception, and self-dealing on the part of plaintiff Marc Schaffel.
To say that Schaffel is an unsavory character would be an understatement. He is a professional swindler and pornographer with a long history of dishonest, immoral and manipulative behavior.
…Shaffel is now claiming that Mr. Jackson owes him money from those arrangements; Mr. Jackson claims that Schaffel, who controlled the bank accounts into which millions of dollars of Mr. Jackson's money was placed, owes him money.
The circumstances surroundng the initial financing of NVE are telling. Schaffel arranged for the trusting Mr. Jackson to borrow $2,000,000 from a factoring company at a high rate of interest — 48 percent per annum Schaffel received a commission from the lender, and put the $2,000,000 into a bank account for NVE.
Schaffel arranged things so both he and Mr. Jackson would be signatories on the account. Mr. Jackson, however, never wrote a single check. Schaffel controlled everything. Schaffel also opened two more accounts for NVE without Mr. Jackson's signature. (pg 2 of Trial Brief)
In 2003, after Martin Bashir's smear video against Mr. Jackson aired, Jackson aides hired Mr. Schaffel to produce two rebuttal documentary specials "Take 2: The Interview They Wouldn't Show You" and "Michael Jackson: Private Home Movies".
There were shown domestically on the Fox network as well as internationally. Defendants received a total of $10,035,252 in gross domestic and foreign proceeds from these documentaries. (page 2 of Trial Brief)