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Nancy Grace

DEA Joins Jackson Death Investigation

Aired July 02, 2009 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news tonight. Just obtained, as we go to air, previously kept private video of Michael Jackson just hours before his death, in full dress rehearsal, Michael Jackson seemingly performing from beyond the grave. But tonight, why is it released?

(MICHAEL JACKSON REHEARSAL VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. Michael Jackson seemingly performing from beyond the grave. We have just obtained the private video of Jackson`s full dress rehearsal just hours before he collapses and pronounced dead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The first videotape we have seen from that -- that final full dress rehearsal that Michael Jackson had on Tuesday night. Those who loved Michael Jackson, they will say it`s Michael Jackson in his top form.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was very energetic. He was happy. He was more playful than he normally was at rehearsal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Others might say that he looked thin. And we really don`t see many dance moves.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The nation`s top drug cops are now joining the investigation, DEA agents looking specifically at the role that prescription drugs could have played in Michael Jackson`s death.

CHERILYN LEE, REGISTERED NURSE: He was so adamant about, I will pay any amount of money for someone to put me to sleep. I looked at him, and that was the first time I got this chill through my body. And I said, Michael, if you take that medicine, you might not wake up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Michael Jackson`s will continuing to create a lot of buzz, especially the section about who he wanted to care for his kids.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Katherine Jackson nominated as guardian of his three kids, Diana Ross the backup, Deborah Rowe, birth mother of the two oldest kids, specifically excluded.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Will she put up a fight for Jackson`s kids? Rowe`s attorney says she has not decided yet.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Straight out to Paul Vercammen. He is standing by there at the Staples Center. Paul, we understand that there is going to be some type of memorial at the Staples Center. But first let me ask you, where did this video come from? This is Michael Jackson in full dress rehearsal, pushing himself to make it through that rehearsal just hours before he collapses in his own home in front of his son and dies.

PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN PRODUCER: Well, Nancy, quite a surreal scene here at the Staples Center earlier this morning. What happened was that AEG, who`s been promoting Michael Jackson all along, which owns the Staples Center, decided that it would roll out this tape and allow some interviews. So what happened was about 12 of us were allowed to go into a room inside the maze which is the Staples Center. There was heavy security all day long. We were wearing plastic wristbands as if we were hospital patients.

And then the people with AEG said, before they began this, We want to release this tape and show to everybody because we`re sick and tired of this talk that Michael Jackson was somehow absolutely sick and on his death bed. And then they then played the tape. So it was AEG, who very much wanted to get in front and I guess show the world that Michael Jackson wasn`t on the precipice of death and that he was, indeed, rehearsing and practicing and up there with the other dancers and all of that, Nancy.

GRACE: Paul Vercammen, explain to us again who or what is AEG that released this video, this video taken just hours before Michael Jackson collapsed dead.

VERCAMMEN: What a great question because AEG, basically, in a sense, had very much taken over Michael Jackson`s life from the standpoint of this. They are the company that owns Staples and other concert promotions. They were going to put on the London shows, all 50 of them. AEG put up the bill, so to speak, to put Michael Jackson in what they were hoping would be a very insulated environment, inside the Holmby Hills estate, where they thought Michael Jackson would be resting, preparing and gearing up for the concert. After all, this is AEG putting up a huge amount of cash to pull this off.

And AEG also, somewhere in the making of the contract, said Michael Jackson should be watched over by the physician of his choice. So that`s the role that AEG was playing. And they thought that they had taken the proper steps to ensure that they would get, basically, a return on their investment, and their investment in this case was very much everything that is Michael Jackson.

GRACE: Joining me outside the Staples Center is Paul Vercammen. And apparently, there is going to be some type of memorial there at the Staples Center, and you`re going to get charged $25 apiece to pay your respects to Michael Jackson.

I want to go out to Mary Margaret, senior news editor with Radaronline. Mary Margaret, it seems that the vultures are surrounding him even now in death, trying to make a buck off him, even selling T-shirts at the memorial?

MARY MARGARET, RADARONLINE.COM: Right. Of course. I mean, Michael Jackson is one of the biggest stars in the world. And obviously, his tragic passing is a big opportunity for a lot of those people who feel like this is their moment to capitalize.

GRACE: We are taking your calls live. Out to Bridget in California. Hi, Bridget.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How are you, Nancy?

GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just -- you know, you talk about all these drugs with Michael. And you know, when do doctors become responsible? I mean...

GRACE: I`m sorry. I can`t hear you. Could you repeat, Bridget?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. I said when do doctors become responsible? I can only imagine the doctors in southern California, when any major person walks in, they`re not going to turn them down, no matter what they want.

GRACE: Are you talking, Bridget, about giving him the sedatives? Is that what you`re talking about?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Any drugs. Any drugs.

GRACE: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If he need stuff to stay awake, if he needed stuff to go asleep, OK, he comes in, I`m Michael Jackson, I`ll pay you anything, will you help me? When do they say, you know, I can`t do that? And he will, he`ll go find somebody else. If he continued to get turned down, he wouldn`t have been in the position he was in.

GRACE: You know, out to Natisha Lance, our producer on the story. She`s standing by at the Jackson parents` home. We are now learning that there are allegations that Michael Jackson was using all sorts of aliases to get prescription drugs. What do you know, Natisha Lance?

NATISHA LANCE, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, right now, Nancy, the DEA has now joined forces with the coroner`s office, a part of this death investigation for Michael Jackson, and they are investigating just that, these alleged aliases that Michael Jackson had, also looking into where these prescription drugs may have come from.

The specific division with the DEA`s office that is looking into this is one that tracks down prescription drugs, trying to find out who`s originating them, who`s writing them. So they`re looking into the doctors who may have prescribed this and how Michael Jackson, if that is the case, wound up with so many prescription drugs.

GRACE: Back to Paul Vercammen, standing by at the Staples Center, the location of a Tuesday memorial where you`ve got to pay money to pay your respects. And you can buy a T-shirt. Paul, what type of aliases was he using?

VERCAMMEN: Well, from what we understand, some of it was made-up names and some of it might have been people that were his bodyguards, so anything that, basically -- this is all alleged, of course -- anything that would allow him to get ahold of prescription drugs that he didn`t think that he could get enough of, allegedly, in abundance.

GRACE: To Dr. Marty Makary, physician and professor of public health at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Makary, thank you for being with us. Look, I know it`s going to be tough for you to turn on your own, but when are doctors responsible? These pharmacists, yes, maybe they`re kind of responsible, but they`re following orders. They are following orders of a prescription written by a doctor.

DR. MARTY MAKARY, PHYSICIAN, JOHNS HOPKINS: Well, I`ve got to be honest with you, Nancy. We as a profession admittedly acknowledge we don`t do a great job of policing ourselves. And when you put a doctor in a position where his patient is also his employer -- that is, this idea of a private celebrity doctor -- oftentimes there`s a conflict of interest, and they get rotten care.

GRACE: So what`s to become of -- I mean, what`s going to happen? We`re going to have somebody like you speaking out against this practice on air, but what`s to become of these doctors that allegedly wrote all these prescriptions to Michael Jackson under false names?

MAKARY: Well, my guess is that the California state medical board is going to revoke all of their licenses, and there may be jail time involved. But remember...

GRACE: Put Makary up on the screen because I want to see him say that with a straight face. Remember "octomom," and there was the doctor that put all of these kids in her tummy for her to give birth to all these children, way past the standard of care for in vitro. Nothing`s happening, OK? Why do you believe that anything is going to happen to these doctors? Nothing ever happens to the doctors.

MAKARY: Well, doctors oftentimes -- you know, we are a self-regulated profession, different from other professions. So I`ll give it to you that it`s difficult to prosecute doctors. But remember, the doctors may not have been involved in writing the prescription. They could have been falsified. Or the doctors could have been involved in writing them, in which case the California state medical board can say, Enough medicine for you guys. You no longer have a license for the rest of your careers.

GRACE: Speaking of the government of California, back to Paul Vercammen, standing by at the Staples Center. Paul, I understand that even Arnold Schwarzenegger tried -- the governor of California tried to intervene on behalf of the Jackson family to have Jackson buried at Neverland. Why? I mean, you don`t just bury a body out in the back yard. And number two, why didn`t it work, when you`ve got the governor trying to make it happen? Even he couldn`t make it happen?

VERCAMMEN: Well, there`s a lot of things at play here, not the least of which is they`re trying to do this in Santa Barbara County, which is arguably one of the most difficult places on the planet to jump through hoops in any kind of planning commission or zoning commission.

Now, let`s go back to where Neverland is. It`s in ranchland. Michael Jackson`s neighbors are viable ranchers. And so that`s called "agriculture preserve." So when you get into this, even the governor may not be able to supersede county laws which say, This is what you can do there. For example, Michael Jackson`s ranch right now, they couldn`t sell it and make it into condo world. Those parcels, I was told by a county planner, can only be divided into three separate pieces. So that`s what they`re fighting.

GRACE: Paul Vercammen joining us there at Staples Center. Tuesday, is set to go down quite the spectacle, as the vultures circle around Michael Jackson`s dead body. They`re trying to make money off his memorial.

You are seeing just released video, private video of Michael Jackson in full dress rehearsal just hours before his collapses in front of his young son and dies.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: We are showing you video that we have just obtained, video released by AEG. They wanted to prove to the world that Michael Jackson was fit as a fiddle just hours before he collapses dead.

Paul Vercammen, explain again who is AEG?

VERCAMMEN: AEG is the company that owns Staples Center and a lot of other interests. They are basically in the business of promotion, and they are the people who had taken over Michael Jackson`s career, in a sense, not only putting on the 50 concerts in London, but also putting him up in the rented mansion in Holmby Hills and also making sure that he had some kind of medical attention 24 hours a day. They said they would assign a doctor to him, the doctor of his choice, Nancy.

GRACE: I mean, let`s unleash the lawyers. Everybody, we`re taking your calls live. Gloria Allred -- you know, Gloria Allred, family law attorney, victims` rights advocate out of LA, Alexis Martin Neely, estate attorney out of LA, Mickey Sherman, renowned attorney out of New York, and Daniel Horowitz, famed attorney out of the San Francisco jurisdiction.

Gloria Allred, they`re proving -- trying to prove so hard how healthy he was, but yet they were assuring he had a doctor `round the clock? Something doesn`t ring true to me. And how do I know he`s healthy? To me, he looks extremely thin, extremely pale. How do I know he wasn`t on some kind of drug to boost his performance and that`s why he needed all of these drugs, so he could come down and go to sleep?

GLORIA ALLRED, FAMILY LAW ATTORNEY: Well, Nancy, exactly right. The old expression, Something is rotten in Denmark. And yes, it`s interesting, by the way, that "The National Enquirer" -- and you know, you can think what you want to think about them, but -- had a headline six months ago that Michael Jackson was unlikely to live six months because of, basically, the cocktail of different drugs that they alleged that he was taking.

And so yes, it`s possible for him to be there at the rehearsal concert but not necessarily be able to do the big tour that he was planning to do. And there were certainly bookies in London taking bets about whether or not he would actually be able to do the tour, a lot of people betting that he wouldn`t be up to it because of his health and because of the allegations of drug use.

GRACE: To Mickey Sherman. It seems to me like it`s a case of CYA, "cover your assets," by AEG, trying to make sure that they are cleared of any wrongdoing, pushing Michael Jackson to perform. I mean, come on. How can you say he`s healthy as a horse and we`ve got a `round-the-clock doctor for him?

MICKEY SHERMAN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: They`re protecting their investment. That`s what they`re doing. It`s about money. It`s about merchandising. And It`s just such an odd epilogue that they`re going to make money merchandising at his funeral or wake or whatever they`re going to call it at the Staples Center.

But you know, I agree with your other guest -- I disagree with your other guest. No doctors are going to jail here. If it wasn`t those doctors, he would have found other doctors. This was a slow-moving train wreck. AEG was trying to recover their money, trying to protect their assets, trying to get him ready for the tour and just make money. They didn`t care about Michael Jackson.

GRACE: Speaking of making money, to Daniel Horowitz out of San Francisco. Daniel, who is going to make the money off charging people that come to his memorial $25 a ticket, and you can buy a T-shirt?

DANIEL HOROWITZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, Nancy, I would assume that AEG owns the rights to most of Michael Jackson`s performances and -- and so on, going forward. I also think they`ll end up selling the video that you`re showing parts of. So in a sense, we`re advertising the video for them today.

GRACE: And to Alexis Martin Neely. Apparently, this video is going to be made into some type of a movie. Where is that money going? And since you are the estates attorney expert, let me ask you this. In his will, he leaves 40 percent to his mom, 40 percent to his children, 20 percent to charity. But at the death of his mother, all that money goes to his three natural children. Would she be allowed to disburse or give away the money during her lifetime to other family members?

ALEXIS MARTIN NEELY, ESTATE ATTORNEY: Well, if that money is going to her -- we don`t actually know that. What we know is that the will says that the money is going into the Michael Jackson family trust. We haven`t seen the trust, so we don`t know what the terms of it are. That`s going to be dictated completely by the trust, if she can give it away or not.

(END VIDEOTAPE))

GRACE: Right now, you are seeing the $25,000 custom-made casket for Michael Jackson. The color, flame blue. It`s extremely rare, only known to be used with James Brown.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: Joining me right now is a very special guest, Uri Geller. He is joining us from London, England.

Sir, thank you so much for being with us. You have been a long-time friend of Michael Jackson. And it`s my understanding that on many occasions you tried to stop him from using prescription drugs.

URI GELLER, FMR. FRIEND OF MICHAEL JACKSON, SAYS HE TRIED TO STOP JACKSON FROM TALKING PRESC. DRUGS (via phone): Look, Nancy, all I can tell you is that I`ve seen Michael in situations where I was extremely concerned for his health and his life.

I think I was the only individual that dared to shout at Michael and, indeed, I -- on numerous occasions, I simply screamed, Michael, you will die if you continue this. This will kill you.

And I -- I couldn`t do more simply because I did not live with him. I was living in England. He traveled the world. And he lacked a person next to him, somebody who`d really care for Michael.

GRACE: With us is Uri Geller for London, England. A long-time friend of Michael Jackson`s.

Mr. Geller, where would he get the prescription drugs? It is illegal for doctors to just write all these prescription drugs, even under false names he was getting them, apparently.

GELLER: Nancy, I agree with you. I wish we knew where he was getting them, but he was. Some of the people around him never said no to Michael. What Michael wanted, he got.

I remember that on a few occasions, I had to sleep next to his bed on the floor. I slept in sitting rooms next to his bedroom to make sure that he will wake up coherent the next day so that we could go out to the places we wanted to go.

But I must add something else. This is very important. Please let me finish. You know, Nancy, the great tragedy of his life, of Michael`s life, is that Michael was not permitted to be the simple, humble man that at heart he was. He always was.

Instead, he was driven to stardom at the age of 5. And we all know that by an ambitious father. He was dogged by controversy all his life.

I believe, Nancy, and you might be quite disappointed to hear this, because you belong to the media, but I believe that the media must take much of the blame for his slow destruction and eventual death with his sanity positive and his health rocked by the global bullying.

That`s what it was. It was global bullying. It is incredible to me that Michael stayed as normal as he was.

GRACE: Mr. Geller, I appreciate your opinion that the media, including myself, is at fault here, but, sir, I do not believe the media is responsible for him taking illegally obtained drugs.

I would like to ask you, however, why didn`t his family or friends intervene? Why did they allow him to deteriorate in this manner, leaving behind three children without a mother or a father?

GELLER: Nancy, I ask this same question. Look, there is no doubt in my mind that his mother and his father and his brothers and his sisters were worried. Believe me, they probably tried to stop it. But he was a grown-up man, almost a child in a body of a 50-year-old man.

And he was traveling the world. You know, he -- he was free to do whatever he wanted. It`s the people that surrounded him. That`s the big question mark. Who supplied these things to him? And this is what angers me. I mean, there are so many other things that, you know, I saw Michael do.

There was -- one day here in London where I promised the London zoo that Michael would go and see them. He wanted to see gorillas. And I couldn`t wake him up, Nancy. I stood there by his bed with Matt Fiddes his bodyguard and we -- we shook him. Michael, Michael, wake up. Are you OK?

And when he finally kind of opened his eyes, I said, what did you take? What did you do? He said, I`m jet-lagged. So, you know, I couldn`t be there all the time, Nancy.

GRACE: With me is Uri Geller joining us from London.

To Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst and author of "Dealbreakers," there`s a lot of finger-pointing now the morning after. Everybody laying blame. What do you think?

BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST, AUTHOR OF "DEALBREAKERS": I think that this is a sad and familiar story of the drug addict, doctor shopping, getting prescriptions at one place and then another. But I think what`s really important to note is that long-term substance abusers will often begin to binge just as they`re about to enter a period of time which will demand sobriety of them.

So for instance, the night before going into rehab, they`ll binge. Or just before taking on a new job, they`ll binge. Or before walking down the aisle with someone who disapproved of their alcohol or prescription drug abuse, they`ll go out and party it up.

So I think what AEG failed to take into account is that no amount of monitoring was going to undo this substance abuser`s tendency to freak out at the possibility that he wouldn`t be able to use for some period of time and the complete reaction to that.

And I think that that`s really how to best account possibly for what`s been happening, what happened to him.

GRACE: Everyone, we are taking your calls live. Debbie, Theresa, Nicole, we`ll be right with you. But headline, there is joy in the world tonight. At your request, new photos of the twins. I`ll put them on the Web tonight.

Here they are at the beach. I was gone last week to the Jersey shore. They`re out early, early in the morning in their pajamas and sweaters. That was the road trip. There goes Lucy. In her PJs. There they are, looking out at the water. They didn`t know not to go in the water in their clothes and ran in their pajamas and their Crocs.

Lucy was ready for sun, but it just didn`t happen. There they are going straight into the water. There we are on our road trip. Oh, they went to their very first arcade, Fantasy Island, there at the beach. There`s John David kicked back.

There`s daddy with Lucy. At the arcade riding a miniature hummer. John David building a little sand pile. We had so much fun. On the front porch. There we are at the beach. What a shot. This is from Meredith Mascow (ph) who came and took these photos for us there in Jersey.

John David tore off his sunglasses at the last moment. You know, they get along great. They don`t even really fight that much over their toys. Oh, man. What a day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: You are seeing the last known video just released, private video of Michael Jackson just hours before he collapsed and died in front of his young son. AEG releases this just hours ago to prove they`re not at fault, to show Michael Jackson, as they say, Helen Hardy, just hours before his death.

There`s no doubt about it. This man was a true talent, regardless of what you think about the child molestation charges, as you all know. He and I were on different sides of the fence on that, at odds. This talent, dead leaving questions swirling around his death and three children without a guardian.

To Brian Oxman, long-time Jackson family confidant, lawyer for the family, "Insight" host at KLLA.

Brian, today Debbie Rowe pipes up that she hasn`t decided what to do about the custody of the children. Listen, according to our sources, she stated at a court hearing back around 2002, she didn`t want the children. She didn`t even want to send them a greeting card.

And now she`s popping up saying that she had a deal with Jackson that she would take custody if he died? I don`t buy it.

BRIAN OXMAN, JACKSON FAMILY CONFIDANTE AND FORMER LAWYER; HOST, INSIGHT NEWSRADIO KLAA (via phone): You`re going to hear all kinds of inconsistent statements, and I think what the problem with Debbie Rowe is that she is being agitated by a whole series of people around her to the point that Debbie doesn`t know what to do. So you hear all these inconsistent claims, all these inconsistent allegations from one moment to the next.

GRACE: You know what, Mr. Oxman, you can just stop right there. Doesn`t know what to do? How about do what`s right? If there was a time in her history that she didn`t want the children, she tried to sever her parental rights, and the only reason, apparently, they weren`t officially severed is because Department of Family and Children`s Services never did their investigation to make it official, so you really think a court is going to hand these kids over to her, a mom that tried her best to take the money and run?

OXMAN: I`m going to agree with you, Nancy. I think she faces a terrible uphill battle. And that courts will not look kindly upon her. And the point I`m making is she really doesn`t know what is up or up or down.

She is, I think, basically being ratcheted by too many advisers, too many people telling her what to do. She doesn`t know what`s right. I think you have hit it right on the head.

GRACE: Let`s go back to the lawyers. Gloria Allred, Alexis Martin Neely, Mickey Sherman, Daniel Horowitz.

To you, Daniel Horowitz, she tried to sever her parental rights. She tried her best. She told the judge, according to our sources, I don`t even want to send them a Christmas card, a greeting card. I care that little.

DANIEL HOROWITZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: True, Nancy, but.

GRACE: OK? Now, why now? Remember, she got paid somewhere between $500,000 and $12 million when she finally tried to sever her parental rights? Does she sense a bigger pay day if she gets the children? Or if she tries to get the children, she might be paid of to just go away?

HOROWITZ: I don`t know, Nancy. You know, two years after she gave up those rights, she fought to get them back and the court of appeals ruled in her favor, I believe, in 2006. And I posted that on my Web site. So she fought for her kids before Michael died. I think she`s a mother.

GRACE: Put him up. Put him on the screen, please.

Horowitz, if she fought so hard for her children, why didn`t she ever enforce visitation?

HOROWITZ: Initially she did not. And then she fought to get some sort of basic rights.

GRACE: Really?

HOROWITZ: Yes. And the.

GRACE: She fought?

HOROWITZ: Yes, she did.

GRACE: What?

HOROWITZ: And I read the court of appeals opinion.

GRACE: Then why didn`t she get visitation? Why didn`t she have it enforced and see those children?

HOROWITZ: Well, Nancy, that I can`t answer because Brian Oxman would know better than I. But she did fight legally for it. She`s got the leg up right now. And Gloria will agree. Unless somebody can represent these children.

GRACE: Hey, just speak for yourself, OK? Don`t drag Allred into this. What about it, Sherman?

HOROWITZ: Come on, Gloria. Help me again with Nancy, Gloria.

GRACE: Sherman, I want to hear from you.

MICKEY SHERMAN, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY, AUTHOR OF "HOW CAN YOU DEFEND THOSE PEOPLE?": She is so full of baloney. You know not to decide is to decide. How do you not be able to decide whether you want your kids? Just that -- that statement alone throws it right out of the box as far as I`m concerned.

GRACE: You know, I want to go to Gloria, the only other one -- Gloria, you have intimate knowledge of this case. And I`m speaking now as a mom. And I -- that`s my main job description now.

As mother of the twins, and to think that she could go into court and try to sever her parental rights and all this BS about how she fought for her kids that Horowitz is saying, she never even tried to see them. She never fought for visitation.

GLORIA ALLRED, VICTIM`S RIGHTS ADVOCATE: Well, I think, Nancy, that she would disagree. And we don`t know all of the facts because so much of it has been kept confidential. She did.

GRACE: She gave a 90-minute interview. Hello? In the last 24 hours, what`s confidential, Gloria?

ALLRED: OK. Well, but, in terms of her visitation. I`m saying apparently there was some visitation, minimal at best, I would agree. But what I`m saying is, at this point, Daniel is right. That the court found that she had not properly relinquished her parental rights, therefore she retains them. Therefore if she decides to enter a custody battle or -- in which -- Katherine Jackson.

GRACE: You know, wait a minute.

ALLRED: . is said to be guardian, she will have the advantage simply because she is the parent.

GRACE: Wait. Bethany Marshal, come on. If she wanted -- if she`s been turned away from the front door and told, you know, we`re kicking you off Neverland, you can`t see your children, we would have heard about that. 90-minute interview in the last 48 hours.

She never mentioned anything about not getting to see her kids. And now that money -- it`s just like a shark smelling blood in the water. All these people coming out of the woodwork to try to hang over his dead body and get money.

MARSHALL: This is really appalling because Debbie Rowe is a mother who clearly did not want to mother. She said I am not the mother of those children. Michael Jackson is. The children have the cognizant at this age to say to the court where they do want to go and where they should go if to somebody who has loving, maternal feelings toward them. Most likely the grandmother. But maybe it would be the nanny. I don`t know.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: Straight out to Michael Sapraicone, former NYPD, president of Squad Security in New York.

Michael, the DEA saying this is routine. OK. That`s BS, too. When does the DEA get involved in a heart attack?

MICHAEL SAPRAICONE, FMR. NYPD DETECTIVE PRESIDENT OF SQUAD SECURITY INC.: Well, I don`t think they usually get involved in heart attacks. But I think the NYPD and the LAPD are confident law enforcement agencies. But I think as we know the fed sometimes have a little better leeway than the state authorities do. I think this is a good time.

They can maybe pull some strings and maybe get some information and . Might that come as ready available to the state. I think it`s a good move. And it`s not -- it`s not common. I think it`s a good move.

GRACE: Well, you can say that again. I have seen plenty of heart attack patients. And the DEA wasn`t involved in the investigation. Michael Sapraicone, with Squad Security.

And to Mary Margaret, senior news editor, RadarOnline. The big question is, who are the trustees? Because they`re going to be the ones governing this multimillion-dollar estate estimated at almost $1 billion.

MARY MARGARET, SENIOR NEWS EDITOR, RADARONLINE.COM, COVERING STORY: Well, in terms of the will that was filed in 2002, it`s a multi-entered question. There`s executors of the will, which is John Branca, who`s his longtime lawyer and then also music producer as well. But in terms of the trustees, all of his assets are actually in the family trust.

In the will it does state that he`s going to take care of his mother and his children as well as certain things going to different organizations. But in terms of who actually controls his trusts, that is up for debate at the moment.

GRACE: Mary Margaret, joining us from RadarOnline.

Everyone, let`s stop and remember Army Sergeant Shawn Dunkin, 25, Columbia, South Carolina, killed Iraq. On second tour, awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Army Commendation Medal.

A hero since he was 12. Received a medal of heroism for rescuing five girls from drowning. Loved magic tricks, outdoors, camping, snowboarding. Dreamed of a military career and starting his own family. Leaves behind grieving parents, one brother, two sisters, grandmother Eloise, widow, Ashley.

Shawn Dunkin, American hero.

Thanks to our guests but especially to you for being with us. I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern, and until then, good night, friend.

END