Getty Stephanie Safechuck appears in the Neverland documentary on Michael Jackson.
Stephanie Safechuck, the mother of Michael Jackson accuser James Safechuck, has spoken out about her family’s contact with pop star Michael Jackson in the wake of her son’s graphic accusations against the singer.
James Safechuck’s account of what he says Michael Jackson did to him will air on HBO as part of a two-part series by Dan Reed called “Leaving Neverland.” James Safechuck and Wade Robson are the two main accusers featured in the documentary.
Today, Robson is 36. James “Jimmy” Safechuck is 41-years-old. Both men allege that the pop icon sexually molested them when they were underage. The Jackson estate has hotly contested the accusations. In fact, the Jackson estate has filed suit over the documentary.
Here’s what you need to know:
1. James Safechuck Is the Son of a Hairstylist & Junk Hauler & Safechuck Was Featured in a Jackson Pepsi Commercial
The documentary outlines the backgrounds of both of the main accusers. According to The Washington Post, James Safechuck “was the son of a hairstylist and junk hauler in Simi Valley, Calif.”
He was a child model and actor who worked in commercials. That’s how he met Michael Jackson, while working, The Post reports, on Jackson’s famous Pepi commercial. That encounter led the pop star to extend Jimmy’s family an invitation to join him on his “Bad,” tour, and James Safechuck was “given a cameo role dancing onstage,” The Post reports.
Jackson with Safechuck and an unidentified man.
Safechuck was only 10-years-old when he won the role in the Pepsi commercial, which features the boy sneaking into the singer’s dressing room, Vulture reports.
2. Stephanie Safechuck Says She Didn’t Want Her Son to Stay in Jackson’s Bed
Stephanie Safechuck speaks in the Neverland documentary, and she indicated that she tried to draw boundaries. One of them: She didn’t want her son sleeping in the grown singer’s bed.
“I didn’t think it was appropriate for my son to go sleep with him,” Stephanie says. “And that’s how it was the first trip,” she says, according to Mirror.
However, the Washington Post reports, that line was disregarded and Jimmy Safechuck ended up sleeping in Michael’s hotel room, where, he alleges, Jackson “introduced me to masturbation and that’s how it started. . . . He set it up like, ‘I’m going to show you something everybody does, and you’ll really enjoy it.’ It was like he was teaching me something new.”
What happened to Jimmy Safechuck in Jackson’s hotel room, according to him, is extremely graphic and imparted in detail in the documentary. You can read the explicit details here.
“French kissing, he said that I introduced that to him. It evolved to kissing all over the body and then eventually to kissing the genitals,” Safechuck says in the documentary at one point, according to Vulture, adding that Safechuck says he and Jackson had a “mock wedding ceremony.”
3. Stephanie Safechuck Felt ‘Dumped’ by Michael Jackson
‘I want to speak the truth as loud as I spoke the lie’ – James Safechuck on Michael Jackson and Leaving Neverland t.co/xV4mpt8Ihz
The Neverland documentary paints a picture of accusations in which Michael Jackson would abuse and groom young boys before tossing them aside for other boys, some of who have denied they were ever sexually molester by the singer.
Stephanie Safechuck indicated that she felt Jackson had moved on from them at one point, and he used his short-lasting marriage to Lisa Marie Presley as the excuse, saying it would make it difficult to see them.
“We’ve just been dumped,” Stephanie says, according to Vulture.
4. Michael Jackson Bought Stephanie Safechuck a House, the Documentary Says
Only on @CBSThisMorning Thursday: @GayleKing talks to James Safechuck and Wade Robson about allegations Michael Jackson sexually abused them for years.
One way that Jackson would allegedly keep the parents from blocking his access to their children: Material offerings.
The documentary says that Jackson purchased Stephanie Safechuck a house after James testified on Jackson’s side when Jordan Chandler accused him of sexual abuse, Mirror reports.
The site notes that Stephanie alleges she had no idea Jackson was allegedly molesting her son. “He flies you first class, you have a limo waiting for you at the airport, amazing, you know, it’s a life of the rich and famous,” Stephanie said, according to UK Mirror. “I got to meet Sean Connery . That was big for me. It was like, ‘Oh my God, Sean Connery!’”
5. Stephanie Safechuck Treated Jackson Like ‘Another Son’
CARL DE SOUZA/AFP/Getty ImagesThe King of Pop Michael Jackson addresses a press conference at the O2 arena in London on March 5, 2009.
Stephanie Safechuck explains the close bond Jackson had at the time with her family.
According to Mirror, Jackson “became a regular at the Safechuck’s house in Simi Valley. Stephanie would feed him and wash his clothes like ‘another son’.”
The site says he called her and cried about his loneliness. However, Mirror alleges, James says that Jackson tried to pit him against his mother, even having him listen to his parents fighting on the phone.