Trial Turned Upside Down

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

The defendant's bad back and ailing lung surely feel worse now in the wake of a decision that ought to have Jackson acknowledging, perhaps for the first time, that there is a very realistic possibility he'll be spending the next decade or two of his life in a California state prison.

The ruling by Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Rodney S. Melville, announced in simple, sparse words to a hushed courtroom, allows prosecutors to parade before jurors in the present case a litany of past allegations of sexual misconduct by Jackson with pre-teen boys. It turns the case on its head and in an instant changes the dynamic of a trial that so far has been a disaster for prosecutors.

It gives District Attorney Tom Sneddon a prime opportunity to bolster the credibility of the alleged victim in the case. It complicates by an order of magnitude the job for defense attorneys. It automatically becomes Exhibit A in the appeal of a conviction. It is the bombshell that some trials have and that most don't.

It wasn't hard to discern that the judge wasn't crazy about ruling the way he did. Earlier in the case he had warned prosecutors that he would not rescue a weak case by allowing jurors to hear old stories about Jackson's past behavior that did not generate charges when it allegedly occurred. And earlier in his career, not too long ago, he had allowed jurors to hear similar evidence in a case that ultimately was reversed on appeal. If there were ever a judge situated to give the defense a victory on an issue like this, it was Melville. That's why "Team Jackson" had so much reason to be optimistic going into Monday's hearing.

So why and how did Melville hand prosecutors such a sweeping victory instead?

Because California law is weighed so heavily in favor of the introduction of this evidence - it was the specific intent of the state legislature when it enacted the new law a decade ago to skew cases like this in favor of prosecutors and against sex assault defendants. Why else? Because there simply are too many similarities between what jurors in this case have heard about Jackson's conduct and the new allegations that prosecutors want them to hear. In a battle in which prosecutors had the law on their side and the defense had good facts on their side, the judge gave the nod to prosecutors and, apparently, will rely upon jurors to sort out the facts.

What good facts?

Thomas Mesereau, Jackson's lead attorney, offered plenty when he tried to convince the judge early Monday not to allow in the testimony. First, many of Jackson's alleged "old" victims apparently are not prepared to testify that Jackson molested them or otherwise did anything sinister. This means that prosecutors are going to rely upon third parties whom defense attorneys say all have "an axe to grind," and many of whom have the same credibility issues that plague the accuser and his family in this case. Moreover, Mesereau argued, when a case is as weak as this one, the "unduly prejudicial" impact of this sort of old testimony rises to unconstitutional levels. That makes sense but sense and the law are not always interchangeable. In any event, if Jackson is convicted I'm sure the California appellate courts will sort it out for us all.

The ruling is huge for Sneddon and Company, a life raft to a drowning team of lawyers. It gives them a fresh start, an opportunity to try to convince jurors that Jackson's young accuser isn't making up his story but rather is just the latest in a string of 10 to 13-year-old boys whom Jackson preyed upon, whom he plied with liquor and adult magazines and whom he gradually wore down sexually until molestation was permitted and occurred.

Going into the trial, the question was whether the alleged victim would be credible enough to establish proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Now the question is whether these supplemental "victims" will be able to shore up the accuser's credibility enough to make the difference. It's hard to imagine that they won't.

For the defense, meanwhile, the job had become immeasurably harder. Now, instead of discrediting just one family and one accuser, Jackson's attorneys have to discredit many. Now, instead of telling jurors that Jackson is the victim of just one family's conspiracy to extort money, they have to make jurors believe that Jackson is a persistent victim of this sort of thing. Jurors might be able to give Jackson the benefit of the doubt once, or twice, or even three times, but to expect them to disbelieve witness after witness who testifies that Jackson licked them, or gave them alcohol, or molested them, may simply be too much for Jackson to expect. There is strength in numbers when it comes to credibility and now prosecutors have the numbers with which to work.

With a defendant who is odd to begin with, a defendant who already has admitted to sleeping in the same bed with boys not related to him, this new case dynamic easily could give jurors a reason to convict even if they still believe that his accuser is a little shaky on the facts. And, in that sense, this ruling allows prosecutors to go outside the scope of the facts of this case - and rely heavily upon old facts that weren't even strong enough to generate their own case - in order to close the deal with jurors, a deal they quite likely would never have been able to close without it. That's what Mesereau meant in court when he told the judge that it would be unfair and unjust to allow prosecutors to bootsrap their weak case to victory. That's what Judge Melville struggled with so clearly. And that's why this ruling is such a game-changer.

After years of speculation and settlements, after decades of denials and disavowal, after all the rumors and the questions and the innuendo, it looks for all the world that Michael Jackson's past finally may have caught up with him. If he survives the coming onslaught in court and still is acquitted, perhaps those questions will ease. If he doesn't, it won't matter much anyway. He'll be a felon and a convict.