An exhausted Michael Jackson warned that tour promoters AEG Live were going to “kill” him as he rehearsed for a marathon concert tour shortly before his death, his son Prince testified on Wednesday.
The 16-year-old also recounted the harrowing scenes on the day Jackson died on June 25, 2009, recalling how his younger sister, Paris, was “screaming” as doctor Conrad Murray was trying to revive their father.
“He just wished he had more time for rehearsals,” he told the wrongful death trial, in which the Jackson family accuses AEG Live of negligently hiring Murray to care for the star for his doomed “This Is It” shows.
Murray was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in 2011 for having given Jackson an overdose of the anesthetic propofol, to help him cope with chronic insomnia as he rehearsed for the series of 50 planned London shows.
Previous testimony at the manslaughter trial, and at the current civil case, has heard details of how the self-styled King of Pop’s state of health deteriorated rapidly in the months before his death.
On Wednesday, his son said the singer was upset on the phone “a lot of time,” most of the time with AEG Live chief Randy Phillips.
“He would cry sometimes. He said: ‘They’re gonna kill me, they’re gonna kill me,’” Prince said.
Asked whom he was talking about, he said: “People in AEG, Randy Phillips.”
Prince recalled how he and Paris followed the ambulance that took Jackson to hospital.
“My dad always told us that angels were looking after him,” he said.
At the hospital, “Dr Murray said: ‘Sorry kids, dad is dead.’ We just cried,” he told the jury.
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