Does the flight attendant who gave testimony helping Michael Jackson have a conflict of interest?
Cynthia Bell was called by the prosecution to support its charges that Jackson had asked for wine to be served in Diet Coke cans. But she when she testified that it was her idea — not Jackson’s — to hide the alcohol in the can. She also testified that the alleged victim was “unusually rude... and obnoxious" on the flight.
Turns out that the owner of the airline where Bell works — Xtra Jet — has ties to Michael Jackson. It’s owned by the son of porn distributor Stan Loeb. Loeb is a business associate of Fred Schaffel, the gay porn producer who also worked for Jackson.
“One day Fred called and said he knew someone who was unhappy chartering flights,” Loeb told Los Angeles’s New Times in 2002. “He knew that my son has a chartering business, and he asked if I would talk to his unhappy friend. Then, he put Michael Jackson on the phone. They were driving around in Michael's limousine. My son ended up flying some of Michael's people around.” The mag reports that the owner of Xtra Jet, Jeff Borer, confirmed that his company “got work flying some of Jackson's people through Schaffel.”
Schaffel is currently suing Jackson — all the more reason, says a source familiar with the situation, to keep Jackson out of jail and in business.
“We all believe that people always tell the truth — but do sometimes people shade the truth to make their bosses happy?” the insider told The Scoop. “It’s been known to happen.”
My life with Superman
The widow of actor Christopher Reeve is ready to tell their story.
Dana Reeve has signed a seven-figure book deal to write about her life with the "Superman star," who became a poster boy for the rights and causes of the disabled after he was injured in a 1995 riding accident.
“It’s the story of the changing landscape of their marriage and how their love deepened during their troubling times,” a source familiar with the deal told The Scoop. “Dana is an amazing woman. She had worked with Chris’s agent [Jennifer Rudolph Walsh at William Morris] and his editor [Ann Godoff at Penguin] and thought very highly of them both, so just made the deal with them.” The source says publication is tentatively set for next fall.
Notes from all overEntrepreneurs are already selling Terri Schiavo memorabilia on eBay. Among the goods: Terri Schiavo cufflinks, a “feed me” T-shirt, and a “mixed media cuff bracelet. . . . representing Terri Schiavo as Joan of Arc at rest amidst red and black roses.” . . . Talk about a penny saved is a penny earned: Rod Stewart is reportedly trying to get discounts on designer wedding gowns for his bride-to-be, Penny Lancaster. . . . Sydney Pollack worries that there may not be enough sex and violence in his new film, “The Interpreter.” “Nowadays, if you don't get the gun out fast, the clothes off quickly and have something happening all the time,” the director of the Nicole Kidman/Sean Penn thriller told the London Telegraph, “you can't hold people's attention."
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