Mikey, Muhammad and money

Roger Friedman reports in his column today that Mikey continued to have ties to the Nation of Islam long after it was reported that he'd cut off them off — even as late as the trial. The info came from a Neverland employee during a deposition in the Marc Schaffel lawsuit. According to one-time Neverland Ranch manager, Joe Marcus, in '04 (after the second NL raid) he was told to deliver an "envelope filled with cash" to Leonard Muhammad, son-in-law of Louis Farrakhan, the NOI's grand poobah in charge of bow ties and anti-semitism. Lenny was serving that time as head of Mikey's business affairs and security and was holed up at the Beverly Hills hotel. It was Lenny who was responsible for Mikey's seclusion from his usual gaggle of advisers and family during that time. And, it was this seclusion and association that triggered Mikey baby-mama, Big Deb, to want to regain her parental rights. She didn't want her children, who she considers Jewish, to be near the NOI. Mr. Marcus also confirmed that he'd not been paid at that point (Feb. 1) for 6 weeks and had moved to Arizona. Read the Rog column here.

Meanwhile back at 2Seas Records, the label that should be releasing the Katrina charity single today, there's little on their website to show for it. It takes forever to load and after it does it's merely some oddly-worded platitudes and the label's animated 3-D logo. How's that gonna help the already 6-months-on victims of that bygone hurricane? One line on the webpage states: "No challenge is too great." But, reading that we have to amend it to read: "No challenge is too great, except wrangling a small group of c-list pop stars to warble along with Michael Jackson for charity and get it into the record stores where it'll almost immediately drop from view, helping no one, especially Michael Jackson." Visit the Prince's page here.