Ex-Ray Of Light For Jackson

Attorney Andrew Cohen analyzes legal issues for CBS News and CBSNews.com.

It was an astonishing courtroom result from a woman who was called by prosecutors to help them put Jackson behind bars for a decade or two. It is barely an exaggeration to say that Rowe was so good for the defense that lead Jackson attorney Thomas Mesereau ought to simply recite portions of her testimony during closing arguments. She laid prosecutors low, she raised Jackson high, and she did so in a forceful and dynamic way that was sure to catch the jury's attention.

After Wednesday's brief testimony, we expected Rowe to talk about how she had lied to help Jackson when he was in trouble a few years ago following the airing of an embarrassing network videotape that described Jackson's bizarre relationships with children. But after a brief in camera meeting between the judge and the lawyers before the jury was called in, Rowe never again was asked to explain what she meant. My best guess about what happened is that a deal was made to exclude this testimony because it went beyond the limitations the judge earlier in the week had place on the scope of what Rowe could say to jurors. Even so, we expected her today to help prosecutors in some fashion. She never did. Her testimony started off poorly for prosecutors on Wednesday afternoon and on Thursday it just kept getting worse.

Rowe brutally wounded the prosecution's conspiracy charge against Jackson by denying significant allegations that would have showed a criminal pattern of behavior by the defendant and his entourage. She denied that Jackson's "posse" had cajoled her into "scripting" her answers on a "rebuttal videotape" that those henchmen made in the aftermath of that controversial network videotape. She denied that she was told what to say on the tape. In fact, she denied all of the harsh things that the alleged victim and his family have said about the way they were treated by the Jackson Camp. No pattern here, Rowe testified, after she was brought to the witness stand by prosecutors specifically to corroborate a pattern.

But she did more than that. She distanced Jackson from the conspiracy itself, telling jurors that the "opportunistic vultures" around Jackson (the un-indicted co-conspirators in the case) kept him out of the loop in many instances and actually were involved in a conspiracy against him. By doing this, Rowe gave the jury sinister targets other than Jackson to blame for this sad story and that, too, is not an insignificant gift to the defense. She told jurors over and over again that it was Jackson's people she distrusted, not Jackson, and that Jackson often was unaware of what his people were doing.

More importantly, Rowe linked some of the men who handled Jackson with the alleged victim and his family and then told jurors that she thought all of them were victimizing Jackson. This is precisely what the defense has been telling jurors since Day One of the trial. The image of Jackson as the victim instead of the perpetrator is the core of the defense case here and the fact that this theory would be endorsed by a prosecution witness with many and good reasons to hate Jackson is a big deal. No reasonable person hearing Rowe's testimony could come away with the impression that she believes that Jackson is the monster prosecutors have portrayed him to be, and there are few people alive who ought to know better.

During the trial, Jackson's lawyers also have been describing their client as a good and decent man and Rowe endorsed that view. When she was asked years ago to go on videotape and talk about Jackson, she told jurors, she was eager to do so because she believed Jackson was a "wonderful person" who was "a great father and generous and caring." This from a woman whom Jackson has blocked for years from seeing her children and who, even now, is fighting in court with him to secure certain visitation rights. One unmistakable message to jurors is that Rowe is unafraid of what Jackson is doing with their own children and that's a powerful message to send in a child molestation case.

If Rowe only had delivered that much for Jackson she would have been a wonderful witness. But she did more. She portrayed prosecutors and the police in a negative light, telling jurors that they were keeping information from her (the way the defense says they are hiding information from jurors). She told jurors that she had told the police that Jackson was "very easily manipulated, especially if he were scared" and that she, Rowe, thought that Jackson was "being taken advantage of by" the people around him, people prosecutors did not indict and have not brought to the witness stand. This testimony tracks directly into the vengeful prosecution theory offered by the defense.

Rowe's testimony was so bad for prosecutors that by the time re-direct examination came about the district attorney's office was trying to impeach the credibility of their own witness and trying, too, to make Jackson's un-indicted co-conspirators look good-all this after spending the past two months trying to make those shadowy people look bad! Prosecutors themselves brought Rowe to the stand and before she left it they were trying to signal jurors that she is a loon, an obsessed Jackson fan who still wants to be a sycophant in spite of the treatment Jackson has given her over the years. But even then prosecutors didn't get the job done. They didn't impeach her with nearly enough force for it to make a difference. Why? Beats me.

Because it doesn't go to the core of the molestation allegations, Rowe's testimony was never going to be the knockout punch for either side. And the case is not over in spite of the fact that prosecutors have just endured another awful day. Their problem is that they needed Rowe to help them gain ground with jurors, especially on the conspiracy charge, with time running out on their case. And instead of gaining ground and linking together the case, they clearly lost ground with Rowe and saw the conspiracy charge splinter apart even further.

If prosecutors cannot even win the little battles, how do they expect to win the war? The answer to that question is an unfathomable to me as is the fact that Thomas Sneddon, the District Attorney, just put onto the witness stand another prosecutor witness who was devastatingly helpful to the defense. That should not happen and it cannot happen in a case like this. Meanwhile, we should all be so lucky as to have an ex-spouse like Debbie Rowe. Jackson certainly is, even if he hasn't yet shown it.