In the news today Mrs. Jackson was not in attendance, nor was anyone else from the Jackson camp. Fans were present. As the proceedings began, a Mr. David Berman was called to the stand. Mr. Berman has been retained by the plaintiffs as a music expert witness. Berman, unlike recent witnesses, is there strictly to give his expert opinion. As things got started we listened to testimony about Berman’s awesome music background as the former president of Capitol Records, in which defense Counsel Sabrina Strong tried to tell us he was fired from later in the day. Mr. Berman spent a significant amount of time at Geffen Records, Mitchell Silberberg and Knupp and Capitol Records. Berman graduated from law school and passed the California Bar, unlike some people (Shawn Trell) and was general counsel for one or more record companies. His background is in contracts, litigating and music business affairs. Berman has testified as an expert witness more than 38 times with a 60% to 40% outcome for the plaintiffs. He has witnessed for defense and plaintiffs in the past. Getting down to business. We’re off. As the day gets started Mr. Berman says a number of times that the contract between AEG and Murray was highly inappropriate and unusual. Berman testifies that nobody’s ever done it and it was a conflict of interest. With this contract in place, the doctor would have to answer to the artist and the people compensating him. As the day started off there were objections from defense’s Sabrina Strong coming in left and right, in which Panish (plaintiff’s attorney) says this has already been ruled on. Sidebar. Things settled down considerably after the sidebar. When asked about emails from Ortega to Phillips, the witness says that the AEG executive was dismissive in his concerns for Michael Jackson. Berman also testifies that when Phillips says that Murray is ethical and unbiased the AEG executive recognizes the potential for him to be unethical and sees the potential for a conflict. Mr. Berman testifies that it is not unusual for an artist to have a doctor on tour, nor is it unusual to have others involved in the process of retaining the doctor, but no one representing Michael was involved in retaining Doctor Murray (and he had plenty of representatives or so they claim). Berman says, “You don’t function that way”, when asked about correspondence between Murray and AEG, “It’s as if you’re denying the 3rd party of a 3 party agreement. If you haven’t been paying attention to the trial, Plaintiff’s attorney argues that there was an oral agreement in place, which Berman says is not uncommon. It is a very common thing is the music industry. Berman says that he has paid a substantial amount of money before having a written agreement in place, with the knowledge that one would be put into place at some point. It is also common to agree by email, which is what happened with this agreement when the email was sent by AEG executive Paul Gongaware saying, done at 150k Per Month. Almost immediately after lunch defense attorney Sabrina Strong starts her cross examination, of course refuting everything and/or trying to impeach the witness. One question that was asked and then asked and answered in the playing of the witness’s deposition was actually the exact same answer. Defense counsel also says that once Berman’s testimony was objected or thrown out, to which he clarifies saying that he testified to the value of a record label and the judge really wanted someone with a more economist based opinion, so the judge disqualified his methodology. Berman testified to not knowing a number of things, but stuck to his opinion of AEG and Murray being in a contract together was highly inappropriate and very unusual. Berman says that he is aware of Murray (supposedly) never having been paid. When Berman said that he was not aware of Michael Jackson signing off on more than the 7.5 million in advances he agreed to and that he was unaware of any representative signing off before his death, the defense shows the July 13, 2009 document from Frank Dileo that has Mr. Dileo representing Michael. Michael sent a letter to AEG and whomever else it concerned in May of 2009 stating that Frank Dileo wasn’t to do anything on his behalf unless instructed to. Both men are deceased and cannot speak for themselves. It’s funny that Michael Jackson’s contract says that there are no amendments to be made unless in writing and the production advances that were agreed upon mutually for 7.5 million dollars went up to over 30 million dollars and no one signed off on that or told Michael they had passed the 7.5 mark and that was okay. There was an agreement to do 31 shows with the possibility of doing more (yeah right) and the shows went up to 50 and Michael never signed for that and that was okay, because apparently there was an oral agreement, but Murray’s contract was not fully executed because all parties never signed. So the oral agreement only works when they say it does. You know, only when it is convenient for AEG does the oral agreement work. If the oral agreement says that we did something wrong and have to pay for our misbehaving, then it doesn’t count.
Posted on: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 18:48:46 +0000
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