Jury clears promoter of liability in Michael Jackson's death

By Eric Kelsey and Dana Feldman

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A Los Angeles jury cleared concert promoter AEG Live of liability on Wednesday in a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of Michael Jackson, in a trial that offered a glimpse into the private life and final days of the so-called King of Pop.

The verdict, which concluded that the doctor the company hired to care for the singer was not unfit for his job, capped a sensational five-month trial that was expected to shake up the way entertainment companies treat their most risky talent.

"The jury's decision completely vindicates AEG Live, confirming what we have known from the start - that although Michael Jackson's death was a terrible tragedy, it was not a tragedy of AEG Live's making," defense attorney Marvin Putnam said in a statement following the verdict.

Putnam, who was heckled by Jackson supporters outside the courthouse, said after the trial that AEG Live had never considered settling the case out of court.

Still, the case sent shock waves through the music industry, with concert promoters as well as well-known entertainment insurers expected to beef up policies for acts they insure and potentially raise some prices.

Jackson's 83-year-old mother, Katherine, and his three children sued AEG Live over the singer's 2009 death at age 50 in Los Angeles from an overdose of the surgical anesthetic propofol.

The Jackson family claimed in its lawsuit that AEG Live, the concert division of privately held Anschutz Entertainment Group, negligently hired Conrad Murray as Jackson's personal physician and ignored signs that the "Thriller" singer was in poor health prior to his death.

The family matriarch was in court for the verdict, which came on the fourth day of deliberations, and appeared to be emotional as it was read, lifting her glasses to wipe at her eyes. She smiled briefly as she left the courtroom.

MURRAY WAS 'COMPETENT'

In explaining the verdict outside court, jury foreman Gregg Barden said jurors had concluded that Murray was competent for the job he was hired to do.

"We felt he was competent to do the job of general practitioner," said Barden, who works for the Los Angeles Unified School District. "Now that doesn't mean that we thought he was ethical, and maybe had the word ethical been in the question, it could have been a different outcome."

Juror Kevin Smith, 61, who works for Los Angeles County Department of Public Works, added: "If AEG had known what was going on behind closed doors it would probably have made a world of difference, but they didn't."

Murray, who was caring for Jackson as the singer rehearsed for his series of 50 comeback "This Is It" concerts, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in 2011 for administering the propofol that killed the star. He is in a California prison and is expected to be released later this month.

Jackson family lawyer Kevin Boyle said outside court that attorneys and the family were "of course not happy" with Wednesday's verdict.

"We will be exploring all options, legally and factually," Boyle said.

Jackson fan Julia Thomas, who has been at the courthouse every day for the past five months, said she thought the jurors did not properly understand the second question on the verdict form, which asked if Murray was "unfit or incompetent to perform the work for which he was hired."

"Most of us are shocked," Thomas said. "It's almost like a dream. I think the question went way over their heads. I think it was a trick question."

FAMILY SOUGHT $1 BILLION IN DAMAGES

Jackson family lawyers had suggested in closing arguments that damages could exceed $1 billion if AEG Live was found liable. AEG Live had argued that it was Jackson who chose Murray as his physician and that it negotiated with the singer to pay Murray $150,000 per month, but only at Jackson's request.

University of Southern California law professor Jody Armour said that the plaintiff's argument that AEG Live disregarded Jackson's health in their pursuit of profits did not persuade the jury.

"The jury decided the case on the notions of personal responsibility, and concluded that Michael Jackson had some responsibility in picking Murray and creating the circumstances surrounding his own death," Armour said.

Several relatives of Jackson testified during the trial, including his mother, eldest son Prince and ex-wife Debbie Rowe.

Rowe, who was married to Jackson from 1996 to 1999, told the court that doctors had competed for Jackson's business and took advantage of the singer's fear of pain by giving him high-powered pain killers.

Rowe said she first grew concerned about Jackson's prescription drug use in the early 1990s after he underwent surgery on his scalp and that she saw the singer use propofol to sleep as early as 1997.

PERSONAL LIVES, LEGAL HEADACHES

Following the case, there also may be some changes in store for the entertainment industry as concert promoters and producers move to insulate themselves legally from stars they work with.

"The thing that is really going to change is the boiler-plate and liability waivers in contracts," said Gary Bongiovanni, editor of concert industry trade magazine Pollstar. "When contracts are written, they're going to be a little more clear."

Jay Gendron, a professor at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles and former legal affairs executive with Warner Bros film studio, said employers must draw a line in the sand with stars whose personal lives may later become legal headaches.

"At a certain point you just have to say, 'No,' because the risk is too high," Gendron said. "You have to look at your business template and ask, 'Is this something we're willing to risk?'"

Although AEG Live came out a legal victor, the trial did give the company a black eye, said Rich Tullo, the director of research at Albert Fried and Co who follows AEG Live's main competitor, Live Nation Entertainment Inc.

"I really kind of think this (trial) in the long-term benefits Live Nation with the artists," Tullo said.

"This is a people business and this is a bad people thing. Even if this is the doctor Michael Jackson wanted them to hire. ... Just from the optics of it, it looks awful," Tullo added.

"Where it could benefit Live Nation is in a 5 to 10 percent market share increase," he said.

(The story corrects juror name to Gregg Barden from Greg Barden, 9th paragraph.)

(Additional reporting by Steve Gorman, Piya Sinha-Roy, Alex Dobuzinskis and Dan Whitcomb; Writing by Dan Whitcomb and Eric Kelsey; Editing by Cynthia Johnston, Bob Burgdorfer and Lisa Shumaker)

• Arts & Entertainment
• Celebrities
• Michael Jackson
• Jackson family
• wrongful death lawsuit
• Conrad Murray
• Los Angeles

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Tom Clancy, U.S. master of spy thriller novels, dies at 66

By Scott Malone

(Reuters) - Best-selling U.S. author Tom Clancy, who thrilled readers with vivid descriptions of soldiers and spies in novels including "The Hunt for Red October" and "Patriot Games," has died at 66, his publisher said on Wednesday.

Clancy, whose books sold more than 100 million copies, died on Tuesday in his hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, Penguin said.

"I'm deeply saddened by Tom's passing," said David Shanks, a Penguin executive who had worked with Clancy from the start of his writing career through the upcoming "Command Authority," which is due out in December.

"He was a consummate author, creating the modern-day thriller, and was one of the most visionary storytellers of our time. I will miss him dearly and he will be missed by tens of millions of readers worldwide," he said.

Clancy died at Johns Hopkins Hospital. The cause of death was not immediately disclosed.

His works closely tracked Americans' security fears, moving from Cold War face-offs to terrorist attacks and both fascinated readers with their high-stakes plots and enthralled military experts with their precise details.

The books also inspired Hollywood blockbuster films including "Clear and Present Danger," starring Harrison Ford, and a series of video games, published by Ubisoft Entertainment SA.

Ford and actors Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck played Jack Ryan, one of Clancy's most famous characters, on the big screen.

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Best-selling author Tom Clancy has died at age 66.

"Spending time with Tom prior to shooting was the best part of that whole experience for me," said Baldwin, who starred in 1990's "The Hunt for Red October."

"Tom was smart, a great story teller and a real gentleman."

Clancy's career also benefited from fans within Washington power circles. His 1984 debut "The Hunt for Red October," the account of a rogue naval commander on a nuclear-armed Soviet submarine, won praise from then-president Ronald Reagan, who declared it a good "yarn."

In total, Clancy published 25 fiction and non-fiction books, which also included "The Sum of All Fears" and "Rainbow Six." Later books moved on from the Cold War to deal with terrorism and friction between the United States and China.

FANS IN UNIFORM

The detail of Clancy's novels sometimes raised eyebrows in the intelligence community. According to The New York Times, in a 1986 interview, Clancy recalled meeting Navy Secretary John Lehman whose first question about "Red October" was "Who the hell cleared it?"

But the accurate description of the U.S. military won him fans in uniform.

"His earlier books were ones that had great following in the military because of their accuracy," said Tad Oelstrom, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant-general, who now serves as director of the national security program at Harvard University.

Oelstrom recalled meeting Clancy at a dinner in 1999 at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. Even at the height of his fame, when surrounded by high-ranking fliers telling war stories, Clancy was a careful listener, Oelstrom said.

"My suspicion is he was soaking up as much as he was giving, just because of the stories that were being told about the Vietnam era," Oelstrom said.

His most recent book, "Threat Vector," debuted at the top of the Publishers Weekly bestseller list in December 2012. His publisher is a unit of Britain's Pearson PLC.

Clancy's next book, "Command Authority," is due to be published on December 3.

Clancy is survived by his wife Alexandra Llewellyn Clancy and their daughter Alexis Jacqueline Page Clancy, and four children from a previous marriage to Wanda King, including Michelle Bandy, Christine Blocksidge, Kathleen Clancy and Thomas Clancy 3rd.

Clancy grew up in Baltimore and in 1969 graduated from Loyola University in Maryland. He worked as an insurance broker before selling his first novel. He was also a part owner of the Baltimore Orioles baseball team.

In a 1992 interview with The Baltimore Sun, he attributed much of his success to being "lucky," saying that he had a normal middle-class American upbringing.

"I was a little nerdy but a completely normal kid," Clancy told the newspaper. "Mom and Dad loved each other. It was like 'Leave it to Beaver.'"

(Reporting by Scott Malone; Additional reporting by Patricia Reaney; Editing by Diane Craft, Toni Reinhold)

• Arts & Entertainment
• Books & Publishing
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Catholic rebel Kueng, 85, considers assisted suicide

By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

PARIS (Reuters) - Hans Kueng, Roman Catholicism's best known rebel theologian, is considering capping a life of challenges to the Vatican with a final act of dissent - assisted suicide.

Kueng, now 85 and suffering from Parkinson's disease, writes in final volume of his memoirs that people have a right to "surrender" their lives to God voluntarily if illness, pain or dementia make further living unbearable.

The Catholic Church rejects assisted suicide, which is allowed in Kueng's native Switzerland as well as Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and four states in the United States.

"I do not want to live on as a shadow of myself," the Swiss-born priest explained in the book published this week. "I also don't want to be sent off to a nursing home ... If I have to decide myself, please abide by my wish."

Kueng has championed reform of the Catholic Church since its 1962-1965 Second Vatican Council, where he was a young adviser arguing for a decentralized church, married priests and artificial birth control. The Council did not adopt these ideas.

A professor at the German university of Tuebingen since 1960, Kueng was stripped by the Vatican of his license to teach Catholic theology in 1979 after he questioned the doctrine of papal infallibility and ignored Vatican pressure to recant.

The university responded by making him a professor of ecumenical theology, securing him a post from which he wrote dozens of books, some of them best-sellers, and many articles.

NOT LIKE JOHN PAUL OR MUHAMMAD ALI

In the third and final volume of his German-language memoirs, Erlebte Menschlichkeit (Experienced Humanity), Kueng wrote that a sudden death would suit him, since he would not have to decide to take his life.

But if he does have to decide, he said, he does not want to go to a "sad and bleak" assisted suicide center but rather be surrounded by his closest colleagues at his house in Tuebingen or in his Swiss home town of Sursee.

"No person is obligated to suffer the unbearable as something sent from God," he wrote. "People can decide this for themselves and no priest, doctor or judge can stop them."

Such a freely chosen death is not a murder, he argued, but a "surrendering of life" or a "return of life to the hands of the Creator."

Kueng, who writes openly about his Parkinson's and other medical problems in old age, said this death was compatible with his Christian faith because he believed it led to the eternal life promised by Jesus.

He cited the late Pope John Paul's public struggle with Parkinson's and the silent suffering of boxer Muhammed Ali, also afflicted with the disease, as models he did not want to follow.

"How much longer will my life be liveable in dignity?" asked Kueng, who said he still swims daily but is losing his eyesight and his ability to write his books by hand as usual. "A scholar who can no longer read and write - what's next?"

Kueng, who repeatedly criticized the now retired Pope Benedict during his papacy, described Pope Francis as "a ray of hope". He disclosed that the new pontiff had sent him a hand-written note thanking him for books that Kueng sent to Francis after his election in March.

It seems highly unlikely the new pope will include support for assisted suicide among possible Church reforms he was discussing with eight cardinals in Rome on Wednesday.

Speaking in Sardinia in late September, Francis denounced a "throwaway culture" that committed "hidden euthanasia" by neglecting and sidelining old people instead of caring for them.

A spokesman for Rottenburg-Stuttgart diocese, where Tuebingen is located, said Kueng's views on assisted suicide were not Catholic teaching. "Mr Kueng speaks for himself, not for the Church," Uwe Renz told Stuttgart radio SWR.

(Editing by Mark Heinrich)

• Religion & Beliefs
• Society & Culture
• The Catholic Church

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Actress Halle Berry gives birth to baby boy

By Andrea Burzynski

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Actress Halle Berry gave birth to a baby boy on Saturday, her representative confirmed to Reuters.

The baby is Berry's second child and her first with French actor Olivier Martinez. Berry and Martinez, both 47, married in July. Berry has a five-year-old daughter, Nahla, with Canadian model Gabriel Aubry.

Berry's representative declined to give further details.

A former model, Berry has appeared in over 30 films, and won a Best Actress Oscar in 2001 for her role in the drama "Monster's Ball," becoming the first and only African-American woman to win an Oscar for a leading role.

She will reprise her role as Storm in "X-Men: Days of Future Past" when the film hits theaters in May of 2014.

Berry was previously married to baseball player David Justice and R&B singer Eric Benet, and had a five-year relationship with Aubry that ended in 2010.

She and Aubry reached a custody agreement in November 2012 after a bitter public battle over their daughter.

(Reporting By Andrea Burzynski; Editing by Eric Walsh)

• Arts & Entertainment
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• Halle Berry
• Gabriel Aubry
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France bows to stage director Patrice Chereau, dead at 68

By Tom Heneghan

PARIS (Reuters) - The French theatre, opera and film director Patrice Chereau, who mounted one of the most famous productions of Richard Wagner's "Ring" cycle in Bayreuth in the 1970s, has died at the age of 68.

Chereau, who was preparing a production of Shakespeare's "As You Like It" when he succumbed to lung cancer, was a restless innovator who began directing at high school in Paris and never looked back.

His last work, a production of Richard Strauss's opera "Elektra" in Aix-en-Provence, France in July, won wild plaudits and critical acclaim for the way it brought out new depths in the tragic characters.

"One of the greatest French artists has just died," President Francois Hollande said of Chereau after his death was reported by newspaper Liberation. "France has lost an artist of universal proportions who made it proud around the world."

The Paris daily Le Monde said: "Few men and few artists have lived as intensely and left such a towering legacy. There were all the directors in one category, and then Patrice Chereau."

The son of struggling artists, Chereau began his career in the mid-1960s directing a Paris theatre with a strong left-wing political bent. In 1969, he went to work at Milan's Piccolo Teatro with the Italian director Giorgio Strehler.

By 1971, he was back in France, this time in Lyon, where his "violent, virulent and sumptuous theatre" presentations, as the Paris daily Liberation put it, built his reputation further.

Then in 1976, when the French conductor Pierre Boulez asked him to direct Wagner's "Ring" cycle of operas at the legendary festival in Bayreuth, Chereau made his unforgettable debut on the international opera scene.

His adaptation of Wagner's Nordic myths as a 19th-century drama of capitalist exploitation of workers met with raucous boos at its debut. But at the end of its final presentation in 1980, the audience saluted him with an hour and a half of exuberant applause.

"We always worked together with a lot of passion," Boulez said after learning that Chereau, whom he called "the only director I wanted to work with", had died.

"What made his work stand out was the extreme precision with which he created a character out of the slightest figure," he told Le Monde. "I always felt confident with Chereau - when he wanted to try something out, I always told him 'yes'."

Chereau also turned his talents to the cinema, producing films while he also worked in theatre and opera. His first efforts in the 1970s were not critically acclaimed.

But he won a Cesar, the French equivalent of the Oscars, for best screenplay in 1983 for "L'homme blesse" (The Wounded Man).

In 1994, his film "La Reine Margot" (Queen Margot) won the Jury Prize and best actress prizes at the Cannes festival. Five Cesars followed the next year.

His 2001 film "Intimite" (Intimacy) won the Golden Bear for best film at the Berlin Film Festival.

Chereau credited his parents with stirring his interest in art, especially drawing. "I knew at 15 I wanted to do theatre," he once said. "It came from drawing. I read texts and I drew."

At high school, he designed sets for the plays he directed. He also studied German and classical literature, two influences that showed through his career as he chose both modern German and ancient Greek dramas for his productions.

Reflecting on his tendency to try his hand at various forms of his art, he said: "I'd go crazy if I thought I was doing three different jobs. I know I'm only doing one."

(Reporting By Tom Heneghan; editing by Michael Roddy and Tom Pfeiffer)

• Arts & Entertainment
• Performing Arts
• Richard Wagner

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