Will leaves fortune to 3 children and mother

MICHAEL JACKSON left his fortune to his three children and his mother, the singer’s will revealed yesterday.

The entire estate is left to a family trust, which means under US laws the exact details do not have to be made public.

But the will, made in July 2002, cuts out his former wife Debbie Rowe.

The family trust will provide for the children – aged between seven and 12 – and Jackson’s 79-year-old mother Katherine.

It will also distribute some of Jackson’s fortune to several charities, website TMZ.com reported.

When the will was written, Jackson’s estate was estimated to be worth more than €350 million.

The will also names his mother as the guardian of the children and singer Diana Ross as a successor trustee to Jackson’s mother if necessary.

Reports in the US last night suggested there would not be a public showing of the body at the Neverland ranch – about 240km north-west of Los Angeles – tomorrow.

Santa Barbara County officials said there were no final decisions by the Jackson family for any funeral or memorial service in the county or at Neverland.

Once a symbol of Jackson’s success and excesses, Neverland – the 2,500-acre property in the hills of Santa Barbara County’s wine country – became the site of a makeshift memorial after his death following a cardiac arrest last Thursday.

Meanwhile, his long-time friend and leading civil rights campaigner Jesse Jackson urged mourners to “celebrate Michael’s life” amid reports that obsessed fans were committing suicide in the wake of the superstar’s death.

In a message posted on YouTube, Mr Jackson said: “This is a time that, while our hearts are heavy and there’s great pain, we celebrate Michael’s life.

“And we celebrate his life by creating futures not funerals, futures not funerals, to make Michael happy and maintain his sense of dignity, [his] sense of decency.

“We fall down sometimes, we get back up again. That’s the right thing to do.

“In Michael’s name, let’s live together as brothers and sisters and not die apart as fools.”

Jackson’s death also prompted a spike in his US album sales, which were up to 422,000 in the week to Sunday, compared with 10,000 a week earlier.

A total of 2.3 million tracks have been downloaded in the US since his death.

The week’s tally was greater than all the Jackson albums sold from the start of the year to June 21, Nielsen SoundScan said.

Earlier, a nutritionist said the singer pleaded for a powerful sedative to cure his insomnia ahead of his comeback tour in London.

Cherilyn Lee, 56, a nurse and nutrition specialist in California, said the singer had asked to be prescribed the drug Diprivan – despite warnings that it could have harmful side-effects.

Before details of the will were known, Judge Mitchell Beckloff granted Jackson’s mother temporary guardianship of his three children.

But experts said the personal bankruptcy of Jackson’s parents in 1999 could affect the chances of Jackson’s mother taking control of the star’s estate if it was to be contested.

Beth Kaufman, a Washington DC-based lawyer specialising in estate tax issues, said: “I think it would be a negative factor but not necessarily a disqualifier.

“It could indicate that she is not capable of sound financial management.”

Jackson had been booked to play 50 gigs at the O2 arena in London starting later this month.

The King of Pop’s tour promoter Randy Phillips, president of AEG Live, said he hoped there could be tribute concerts to Jackson.

Mr Phillips denied Jackson was suffering from stage fright and said AEG Live would at “some point” be releasing footage of the rehearsals. He said the show was going to be “beyond anything”.

“The world needs to see this production,” he told Sky News.

“It would have been, which is the tragedy here, one of the most amazing shows ever, so at some point we want the world to see that.”