Jackson Loyalists Undeterred

While Michael Jackson has been fighting the legal battle of his life inside a Santa Maria, Calif. courthouse, a different sort of drama has been unfolding outside the courthouse.

Every morning before dawn, reports CBS News Correspondent Vince Gonzales, a small group of diehard fans gathers, hoping to hit the jackpot: winning a lottery for one of the few seats in the courtroom to watch Jackson's child molestation trial.

They're told they'll be kicked out if they yell or scream for Jackson while inside.

Some have literally put their lives on hold, notes Gonzalez, for a man prosecutors say is a child molester.

"Michael was a part of my childhood. He will always be a part of me," says Doobie Redburn, who came from Los Angeles with her son, Tony.

She says he was born with cerebral palsy.

He claims it was only after his mother put on Jackson's music that he began to move his legs: "She would put on the 'Thriller' album, and I would kick. My legs would kick and my arms would be in the beat of the music. …Today, I am fine, and 'moonwalking' "

Not everyone can claim that kind of MJ miracle, Gonzales says, but some Jackson fans do describe their passion as a moral duty.

"Michael Jackson fans truly are warriors," one remarked to Gonzales. "To be a fan is hard. Like he's saying, he's in a battle."

Fan Maggie DiFiero left her nursing job in San Diego to spend a week in Santa Maria. She is 59 and has two kids.

"I had bone marrow cancer and I was on my deathbed," she recalls. "And I'm not saying he healed me, no. I healed me. But he's soothing."

She's followed the trial closely, Gonzales say, but long ago reached her own verdict.

"No, he's not" guilty, she cried. "He's not guilty of anything."

Despite the chance their hero may go to jail, true believers are still dancing, holding vigils outside his home, and getting together to spend thousands on Jackson memorabilia.

And their devotion was rewarded last April, when Jackson invited fans gathered outside the gates of his Neverland ranch, inside, though with no cameras allowed.

But none were really needed, Gonzales points out, because, for them, the memories will last longer than any scandal.

Court observer and former prosecutor Anne Bremner, who's been following the trial from the start, told The Early Show co-anchor Julie Chen Friday that, "With the fans, it's been a bit of a wax and wane.

"In the very beginning, there were lots of fans. A lot of people have moved here from Europe that love Michael Jackson.

"The fans come in for the lottery and come into court and watch. A lot of them I see every day, the same fans in court.

"But then, it really trickled out for quite a long time. And then yesterday and the day before, there have been so many fans. There's a lot of chanting, you know, 'Michael is innocent!' I can almost hear it in my dreams, because we hear it so much every day. And, 'Fight, Michael, fight.'

"Also, some taunting of some of the more well-known commentators who've taken certain positions, as they go into court.

"Now it's reached kind of a fever pitch again with the fans in their support of Michael Jackson."