Book Review: Michael Jackson Conspiracy by Aphrodite Jones
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[Aphrodite Jones] Authors Note
Aphrodite states
“Somehow, I missed the truth.”
I understand my view may not be a popular one.
I wonder how someone could have attended some if not all of the trial dates, listened to the evidence which I understand was not particularly complicated, and how they could have reported on the assumption of Michael’s guilt and as she said lead viewers to believe that Michael was guilty?
I echo her comment how could she have missed it? Michael Jackson’s innocence!
She states that she:
- Had predetermined the outcome – wrongly
- That she had slanted her media coverage, following others which was very convenient for the prosecution and lead to media bias against Michael Jackson
I note her contrition on reading the not guilty verdict for being part of the Jackson-bashing side.
She states that after a number of hours considering that she called and spoke to the lead jurist. She said that he asserted his innocence.
I am thinking about her interview, and she did get a bit of a hard time from Bill O’Reilly
Michael Jackson Conspiracy – The O’Reilly Factor – Interview
RealAphroditeJones | 11 July 2007
Aphrodite Jones discussed her new book, “Michael Jackson Conspiracy” with Bill O’Reilly on July 5, 2007. Buy “Michael Jackson Conspiracy” on Amazon.com or BN.com.
The following points were made in the interview:
- Aphrodite said that the media had already decided that Michael was guilty before they even had the trial
- She states that this bias was based on prior allegations, that were only allegations
- She admits that she was part of the media conspiracy
- Bill says that she was part of the media conspiracy that thought he was guilty and Aphrodite said “absolutely”. She continues that she is the first person to admit it in her authors note.
- She says that “we” the media decided he was guilty before he was proven innocent, she continues “what’s wrong with America today that we would do that to someone”
- Bill asked if Michael was innocent (funny that he asked this because in another video he said that he never disputed the verdict he believed in system). Bill states that there is a difference between being innocent and being found not guilty
- Aphrodite responded and said that Michael was innocent of the that charge and she said it was proven in her book. But I think it was proven in a court of law over 5 months in 2005 after 20 years of false allegations and being hounded by the media and the state services.
- We unfortunately do not get to see Bill’s face, but Aphrodite continues that they did not cover the trial and what was going on in the court room, she states that they covered was the man. She states that they covered pyjama day, they covered celebrities coming in and out…
- But I don’t think they covered the man, I think they covered their own biased views and what would make a headline.
- Bill cornered her and said that she was covering the trial for them and that she didn’t think that he was innocent, that he was guilty as sin.
- She admits that she did think that he was guilty and comments that so did everyone else. Hold it there, and think about this, and what this means.
- Is it an excuse to determine someone as guilty before they have had their day in court as Michael said just like any other american citizen, just because the other press have condemned him?
- What happened to individual thought? I mean she was in the trial she heard the evidence and as she said she missed it, how can that be?
- She was also a crime reporter and regards herself as an investigative reporter, but she just took the prosecution case and the media bias as gospel and went with it. She made a number of contributions to the global press on the basis of unsafe foundations.
- She put forward these credentials as the basis for people to believe her take on the trial. Michael was guilty beyond any reasonable doubt in her eyes.
- Further did she miss the presumption of innocence until proven guilty?
- Just because her press mates where suggesting that he was guilty did that mean she had to blindly jump to their tune and agree? What about her integrity as an investigative report?
- What was the prosecution evidence that convinced her? However given her comments regarding the accuser’s taped video statement to the police it seemed that one year after the verdict it was her first time absorbing the information and its credibility.
- She said that she was hypnotised by the pack mentality, therefore I assume that there was no need to be convinced of anything because its follower the leader. The importance of being in the group was greater than the pursuit of justice.
- It would almost seem that she was there in body and not in mind or at least not an open mind.
- She said she was in the trial and she was following the pack mentality and the…
- She said that she was hypnotised, but by what, being in the presence of more famous reporters?
- Bill asked her if she went into the trial with a preconceived notion and no matter what she heard didn’t blow her out of that
- She said that was exactly right because everyone else was saying the same thing and she said that she “wanted to follow the crowd“
- I think that this is very worrying. Bill said that he was surprised by this revelation.
- So for the media which she was part and she admits to that, just having the name Michael Jackson meant that he was automatically ‘guilty’ despite the evidence to the contrary and thus there was no need to even hear the evidence.
- Aphrodite was convinced by gossip and rumour and by the prosecution leaks?
- For a true crime writer, this is a shocking revelation. I think that she has been brave to have exposed her gullibility to gossip and rumour with such frankness.
- Bill said that he was surprised and asked Aphrodite when she had her epiphany
- Her response really gets me. She said that this did not occur until a year later.
- Hold that thought, so she went through the trial, spoke about the events on certain trial dates to a televised audience, read/heard the verdict, spoke to the lead jurist and it was only one whole year later in summer 2006 ( I presume) did she then started to believe in Michael’s innocence.
- She states that it occurred when the judge gave her a court order to look at the evidence. She said that she was in the basement of the court house she said that saw the original tape of the accuser giving his confession to the police, she continues that she watched 3 times. She said that the kid was lying through his teeth.
- The thing that got me about this comment was – wasnt she in court when the accuser’s tape was played by the prosecution. The prosecution thought that this was going to be their winning card, and if your pro-prosecution surely your would have been there, and surely you would have been there when the defence destroyed that evidence? But maybe not, maybe she wasn’t in attendance on those days, or maybe as she said she missed it?
- Aphrodite then comments on the accusers credibility
- Bill asked if Michael was a paedophile?
- She states that Michael Jackson was a misunderstood human being, because he does not know how to deal with the adult world, and confirmed that she did not think he was a paedophile
- I think that was a very tough interview for Aphrodite, and she did not avoid the uncomfortable questions.
- I wonder how do you really say sorry to Michael Jackson and his family?
- She reported on television her then views to millions of americans, her views were blinkered by the pack mentality, how do you right the wrong of biased and maybe inaccurate reporting?
I note that in many of the media outlets there was no apology to Michael Jackson and his family, NO SORRY!
On the first page of Aphrodite’s book there is NO SORRY.
Aphrodite makes clear that she does not want to expose her media colleagues for the comments they have made. Understandable, and may be it would not be fair to expect an insider to do this. Despite this, I think the book will prove to be an insight into the thinking of some of the media.
When I flip the first page and read the second, I still feel she doesn’t get it.
Aphrodite comments on the changes in her mind-set, that she started to feel sad for him, not because of the bias but because she felt that the media were against him. She recalls that she went to the gates of Neverland Ranch, a brave act at the time. She wanted to inform the fans that she was reporting the facts. But was that the case? I think else where she admitted that she was following the pack, and by her own admission she said that she had missed important aspects of the prosecution and defence cases.
If she was unhappy with the media coverage and being part of the media, maybe she should not have tried to redeem the situation by addressing the fans at Neverland but by addressing the issue in the forum it was made, i.e. whilst she was reporting on Fox news of E! etc
She said that as a result of seeing and hearing the fans views that her reporting started to change. But why, did she not seen the humanity of the situation? Did she see things from a non lynch mob stance?
Why? Were the facts any different? Had the evidence in court changed? No probably not but she stated that her mind-set changed.
I think this book is very interesting, I am glad that Aphrodite wrote this book.
She says
Because of this visit to Neverland, my reportage took a slight turn. I became more open to the idea that Michael Jackson was not guilty…”
But hey, I don’t understand this, this surely is further confirmation that his ‘guilt’ pre verdict was not based in her mind on any fact relating to the evidence but was on speculative opinion swayed by whose company you’re in? Firstly her media buds and then by the fans outside the Neverland gates?
So was it because she saw the human side through Michael’s fans that she began to see that he could be innocent? This was during the trial – pretty scary concept really, that the facts were not that relevant!
I think i would have preferred her to have disclosed that as the evidence was told that she realised that the prosecution was not substantiated. That there was no case or that the prosecution evidence had been debunked, but this is not what she said.
Why look for evidence via conversation with the fans outside the Neverland gates the evidence was at the court not by the gates!
Aphrodite states that she had been on Michael Reagan’s Radio show which had a national audience she said “bashing Michael Jackson”. I have tried to find out what this bashing was, but I could not find anything. However it would seem that Michael Reagan has some extreme views so I fear the worst.
Aphrodite does accept her responsibility here she said that she was “guilty”.
Page 3 of her book seems in conflict with page one. She said on page 1 that
“Writing a book about Jackson’s innocence never crossed her mind, not during the trial…”
Well I suppose that is understandable because during the course of the trial she thought he was “guilty as sin” as Bill O’Reilly put it.
But page 3 she describes the aftermath of the trial, the media absence and the shallowness of the media friends that she had made.
She states that she was not worried about picking up the next small project because
“I had a bigger picture in mind and had compiled all kinds of data. I still wanted to write a book about Jackson, because after all, i wasn’t at the trial simply to report the news. I was there, primarily, as an author.”
What i find startling is that she only mentions the Michael’s position what he must have felt after more comments about herself.
So here they are:
- After the Jackson “event” she was alone
- She realised that her media buds weren’t her buds at all
- That she had a big project in mind to write a Jackson book that was the point of her attendance
- She shipped her material home as she hoped it would lead to a book
- She worried about the Californian taxpayers, the millions wasted on the case
- Jackson trial she said was the largest in america history
- She mentions the cost of security
- She mentions the impact fee that the county asked her to pay
- and then the big FINAL, she states that the mainstream media thought her a “less than reporter“
- That some networks thought that she was incapable of doing television reporting work.
- She said that she was being discredited.
- and here we have it
“I wondered why i had been put through so much drama and expense and agony – all for nothing.”
- Said that she discovered that the publishers were not interested in a book from Michael’s view-point.
- and she said this
“I was devastated.”
Was she devastated for Michael that he had been put through years of injustice is this what she was referring to, doubtful.
And latterly she thought about Michael, whom she thought was “guilty as sin” ( Bill O’Reilly/Aphrodite Jones interview) during the trial, she was not convinced about his innocence until 12 months after the verdict and only when she obtained a court order to review the evidence she should have been aware of during the trial; and after the trial she thought many reporters discredited her reporting skills, but wanted to do a Jackson book, but then found no one was interested, then it seems about she considers the taxpayers then she thinks about Michael. Good to know he features somewhere in the list of priorities.
so the concept of getting something out of this, a book was more important than the verdict or the injustice to Michael.
So the book topic of the book is spin, when the verdict didn’t come in as she expected.
12 months after she only accepted the possibility of his innocence when reviewing the accusers taped police statement?
Her comments about her epiphany that Bill O’Reilly mentioned left me shaking my head. I unfortunately can see why some comments she mentioned were made.
