Since news hit on Thursday afternoon that pop legend Michael Jackson passed away fans have been in complete shock. Internet search engines have been overloaded with Jackson related searches and television shows have paid him tribute. One of our favorite reality television shows, "American Idol" reran Michael Jackson week from Season 8 and BET's "106 and Park" cancelled their top 10 countdown to honor MJ. I will also be tuning into the BET Awards on Sunday to catch any possible MJ tributes.

So, what's the latest news on Jackson? His autopsy results will be revealed in the coming days. Doctors suspect that he may have had an underlying heart condition. However, rumors have also surfaced saying that Jackson was given Demerol before he was rushed to the hospital. Demerol is a narcotic pain reliever and extremely habit forming. Taken incorrectly it could very well lead to cardiac arrest.

Aside from trying to figure out what took the King of Pop at the young age of 50, fans also want to see pictures of his death. It seems a bit morbid, but perhaps they're just in disbelief. No pictures from the autopsy have surfaced, but "Entertainment Tonight" did have one exclusive photo of Jackson being rushed into hospital. Jackson's death is a part of a trio of Hollywood deaths this week following Ed McMahon and Farrah Fawcett. My prayers go out to the Jackson family.

Shortly after the news of Michael Jackson's shocking death Thursday, fans began arriving by the dozens to the family's 22-room estate in Encino, Calif. They left teddy bears, notes, flowers and candles outside the mansion, which Jackson is said to have adored.

The singer's death was palpable across the world. Hundreds left scrap books, flowers and candles outside his childhood home in Gary, Ind.

Outside the UCLA Medical Center after Jackson's passing, hundreds began chanting, "Michael! Michael!" as another fan blasted "Man in the Mirror" from an iPod dock.

Look back at Michael Jackson's life

"He was the first concert I ever went to! It was my birthday present when I was 6-years old," Missy Traubhill, 29, told Usmagazine.com. "My mom took me and my cousin in a limo, and we went to go see Thriller. I bought a blue muscle T-shirt with him on the front. He was in his little black pants, his skinny little black pants and white socks and black shoes. It was my best birthday memory of my life."

Dionica Bel, 25, recalled that Jackson's HIStory was her first album.

"I wanted to dance like him, to sing like him," she said. "I, to this day, have not stopped trying to moonwalk. He will always be one of the premiere reasons I fell in love with the kind of music I listen to today. He is his own genre. There would be no Justin Timberlake, there would be no Usher, there would be none of those pop artists today, if not for the ground work that Michael Jackson laid out for them."

See Us' photo tribute to stars who have died too soon

Outside NYC's Apollo Theater late Thursday, fans remembered Jackson as well.

"What really touched everybody so much out here is knowing that we lost a great person," Conway Murray, 39, told Us. "It's sad, but it's a great moment to see everybody out here together as one, to share the legacy of Michael Jackson."

Wearing a bright yellow Michael Jackson T-shirt featuring four printed pictures of the singer's face, Latifa Salaam, 54, told Us she was "horrified" when she heard the news of his passing.

"I jumped up. I said, 'No!' But it was true," she said. "So I grabbed the phone and called my daughter, everybody. Everybody heard. I called my sister, called my cousin. They were crying on the phone."

Added Jasmine Watson, 19: "I came out here because I heard the commotion and wanted to be a part of the memorial. It's beautiful. Here we get to see everyone come together and be together to remember him. I don't think there will ever be another King of Pop."

See Us' photo tribute to stars who have died too soon

In NYC's Times Square, a crowd gathered on Broadway and 44th Street outside the MTV studios. An ABC News banner read, "Michael Jackson, King of Pop, Dead at 50." At one point, a bus drove down Seventh Avenue blasting "Billie Jean." Crowds cheered.

Stephanie Defeo, 34, told Us: "I'm heartbroken. You can say Michael Jackson anywhere in the world and people will understand. I can't believe he’s dead. Today was a huge loss in pop culture."

Pop star Michael Jackson barred his ex-wife Debbie Rowe from seeing their children or from talking about his alleged drug use or sex life when the couple divorced, court documents obtained by a website showed today.

In return for a multi-million-dollar financial settlement, Rowe agreed to keep silent about the intimate details of the eccentric Jackson's life, the star is now on trial for child molestation, according to thesmokinggun.com.

The website published a legal document that cited the confidentiality pact.

The pact bans Rowe from talking publicly about "paternity, Michael's mental or physical condition, purported drug use, sexual behaviour" or the lifestyle of her children, according to the document filed by Rowe's lawyer.

Former nurse Rowe met Jackson when she worked for his plastic surgeon and married him in 1996, and bore two children with him in 1997 and 1998 whom she agreed not to contact following their divorce.

"There is a reference that (the) mother is not allowed to communicate with the children, Michael, or his agents, except to make travel arrangements or to send Christmas, birthday cards and letters to the children," Rowe's lawyer Iris Finsilver said in a document dated December 23 last year.

Under their divorce settlement, Rowe, gave up custody of the children -- son Prince Michael Jr and daughter Paris -- to Jackson and agreed not to communicate with them.

In October 2001, she even asked a judge to completely terminate her parental rights, a request that was granted.

But in February last year, shortly after Jackson's November 2003 arrest on charges that he allegedly molested a 13-year-old boy, Rowe began legal moves to regain custody of the two children.

Rowe's lawyer filed the papers containing references to the confidentiality pact as part of the child custody dispute between Rowe and Jackson, who is also trying to keep the confidentiality agreement secret.

Finsilver said Jackson's actions in the custody dispute left Rowe "wondering what kind of a man would fight so long, so hard, so expensive and so gut-wrenching a legal battle just so two minor children are prevented from even knowing their own mother!"

Pregnant with Prince: Debbie Rowe and Michael Jackson in 1996

Today, she bears little resemblance to the fresh-faced blonde who once posed smiling for glossy magazine 'family' photographs with Jackson and their babies. Her hair is still blonde but her body has bloated almost beyond all recognition. At 5ft 10in tall, she weighs around 15st and is clad in denim with a T-shirt which says 'Shut up and ride'.

Eyeliner has been tattooed under her eyes, a process she has topped up every five years. She is also planning on getting laser treatment for her failing eyesight.

She says: "I'm 50 in December. That's a big milestone. I want to lose weight. After someone snatched a photo of me, the newspapers wrote about how fat I'd become. That's so unfair because I've lost 20lb. There'll be saying I'm pregnant next."

Rowe pauses and adds: "As a child I didn't dream of marrying Michael Jackson or anyone else famous. I am not fazed by celebrity. I was born and bought up in LA, where I dreamed of having a ranch with horses. It's taken me a long time, but I am finally doing what I always wanted to do."

Despite Jackson's dire financial straits and rumours that a mortgage company will repossess his Neverland mansion, Rowe denies she is short of money. Every penny goes on her horses, which she sells for up to £15,000 each, and her beloved dogs.

"I can't be bought. I don't need money. I just like to be left alone," she insists.

Bizarrely, as she poses for photographs with her horses, her mind changes. Flushed with the excitement of attention, she announces: "I want a reality TV show. I reckon I'd be great. Can you pitch it for me? It would be me, the dogs and my horses. Do you think they'd go for that in Britain? I think it would be a scream."

But the sight of this middle-aged woman sweating in the heat, craving affection from her animals, is far from funny. One wonders if the children she gave away might have supplied the love she obviously needs, but there seems little chance of that while they remain with their itinerant father.

So does Rowe ever see herself marrying again after her union with a megastar? She says she is happiest living just with her animals. Then she sighs. "There are three stages in marriage. First it's puppy love, then it's for breeding purposes and then, if you can make it through all the bull***t, it's for companionship."

Rowe pauses, then waves a dismissive hand. "I've done the breeding stage. I don't need the rest."

Rowe was quoted as saying later: "I'd never seen Michael so happy and that's what made it so wonderful for me."

So wonderful, in fact, that months later, Rowe was artificially impregnated again. She recalls: "Of course it was artificial insemination. Paris was conceived in Paris, that's how she got her name. Michael wanted to call her Princess, but I thought that was stupid."

Paris Katherine Jackson was born on April 3, 1998, and this time, Jackson later claimed, he simply wrapped the baby in a towel and fled.

Incredibly, it is not the memory of the bloodied newborn being torn from her arms which moves Rowe to tears now - but the sudden admission that she couldn't bear Jackson any more children.

She bursts into tears and, sobbing loudly, says: "I had so many problems when I was pregnant with Paris. After that I couldn't have any more children. Michael was upset about that, he couldn't understand it. He wanted more babies."

Rowe, it appeared, had served her physical use and was simply put out to pasture. She filed for divorce six months later - accepting a pay-off worth £4.2million over nine years, in return for giving up her custodial rights to the children.

The original divorce settlement allowed her one visit every 45 days, though she later applied to the court herself to terminate her parental rights altogether, claiming it was in the children's best interests. Was she coerced? In the Alice in Wonderland world of Michael Jackson, we will probably never know.

He went on to 'sire' a third child - Prince Michael II, known as Blanket - by an unnamed surrogate.

Meanwhile, Rowe claims their relationship remained 'fine'.

She adds defiantly: "It always has been. Michael and I have always got on. I only divorced him because I wanted my life back. I couldn't cope with the constant pressure of fame. He's the genius, the famous one. Not me. I turned out two good-looking kids, but I can't sing, I can't dance."

Despite their divorce after a truly dysfunctional marriage, she still shows a surprising loyalty to the singer: when Jackson was accused of molesting a young boy three years ago, Rowe told the court he was a loving and caring father.

Under cross-examination, she admitted that she had not seen her ex-husband - or her own children - for some years, which rather undermines her claim to me that she still sees them regularly.

Jackson was cleared of sexual abuse, but moved with the children to the Middle East and then Ireland.

In 2006, Rowe took him to court, petitioning for her parental rights to be restored - despite her previous insistence that they should be withheld - and complaining that Jackson had stopped paying her. He claimed she had breached their confidentiality agreement - but a new settlement was reached in secret.

Meanwhile, Rowe was apparently finding her 'celebrity' - or 'notoriety' - hard to come to terms with.

"I used to be an extrovert, but my marriage made me introverted. I was followed everywhere. I hated the fame. After I married Michael, it was hard to keep working. Staff at the clinic sold stories about me to the media. People were offered a million dollars for a picture of me pregnant. I even told my family to sell one; I thought they could do with the money. But they refused."

After her divorce, Rowe continued to live in the Beverly Hills mansion which Jackson gave her as part of their settlement, and studied at an online university to gain degrees in criminal law and psychology.

"I wanted to work in a prison," she explains. "I thought I could help because you can't mess up someone who is already in jail. In the end I loved horses more and I wanted to get away from LA. I was trailed everywhere by the paparazzi."

Three years ago, Rowe sold up and moved to a three-bedroom ranch-style house in Palmdale, an ugly, rundown desert town 60 miles from LA.

Here, in the heat and solitude, Rowe appears to have found some peace. She takes a deep breath and says: "Out here in the fresh air I feel much better. No one knows me here. I don't talk to anyone. I just get on with my life breeding horses. As soon as I saw this place I fell in love with it - for the land. I'm up at 6am with the animals and we have the most extraordinary sunrises.

"I have a boyfriend. He's a murder cop, we've dated on and off for 30 years. Until now, our timing was always out."

My life as the mother of Michael Jackson's children, by Debbie Rowe

Rowe studies the faces looking down at her and says fiercely: "I am possessive and protective of my babies. Their happiness means more to me than anything else on this world. I love them more than I would ever have thought was possible."

It is, one might think, perfectly normal for a mother to feel this way about her children. But the portraits adorning Rowe's walls show her menagerie of animals - not the two children she produced with, and then handed over to, Michael Jackson.

Indeed, there is not even a single, grainy snapshot of either Prince Michael, now ten, or Paris, nine, the children taken from her arms in the maternity ward in exchange for a multi-million-pound pay-off.

More than a decade after this plain dental nurse first joined the bizarre Michael Jackson roadshow, she lives alone breeding horses and dogs. There is little evidence in this impoverished and dusty backwater of the small fortune she is reputed to have received for effectively becoming America's most famous surrogate mother.

Her 'babies' now include 11 dogs, including one half-wolf, a parrot who shares her bedroom and drinks from her coffee cup, a pair of parakeets and 30 horses - many of them pregnant mares. She says, with no trace of irony, that she finds it hard to give away her foals. "I have to send them to a trainer so I can detach myself from them. It stops me becoming too involved."

Rowe worries more, it seems, about a young animal being led away from its mother than she does about the infants who were taken from her by the reclusive superstar. (Jackson later claimed that he was in such a rush to leave the hospital with daughter Paris in 1998 that he cut the cord and left with the baby covered in blood, taking the placenta with him in his haste.)

Since her second child by Jackson was removed, Rowe appears to have had scant dealings with her offspring - although she claims to see them sometimes. Certainly, though, the photograph of the children which made headline news this week - for once their faces not covered by the customary veils - offered Rowe a tantalising glimpse of the children she gave away.

This week, she invited the Mail into her home for an extraordinary, unsettling interview in which she broke the silence she has maintained for years about her infamous children. When asked about their appearance this week, she reacts with the grunt of a satisfied breeder, rather than a sigh of loss. "I turned out two pretty good-looking kids. For that I am proud."

Debbie Rowe blasts Michael Jackson for unmasking their kids

"The veils were my idea, not Michael's," she says in an extensive interview in which she details her sex-free marriage to Jackson (thank goodness for small miracles), her two pregnancies, and her struggles with notoriety. "I had kidnap threats when they were babies. I did not want them to be recognized."

Yes, because when they've got schmattes draped over their heads, they blend.

Lisa Marie Presley is the first wife of Michael Jackson. Upon the death news of Michael Jackson, she expressed herself in her
“Years ago Michael and I were having a deep conversation about life in general.

I can’t recall the exact subject matter but he may have been questioning me about the circumstances of my Father’s Death.

At some point he paused, he stared at me very intensely and he stated with an almost calm certainty, “I am afraid that I am going to end up like him, the way he did.”

I promptly tried to deter him from the idea, at which point he just shrugged his shoulders and nodded almost matter of fact as if to let me know, he knew what he knew and that was kind of that.

14 years later I am sitting here watching on the news an ambulance leaves the driveway of his home, the big gates, the crowds outside the gates, the coverage, the crowds outside the hospital, the cause of death and what may have led up to it and the memory of this conversation hit me, as did the unstoppable tears.

A predicted ending by him, by loved ones and by me, but what I didn’t predict was how much it was going to hurt when it finally happened.

The person I failed to help is being transferred right now to the LA County Coroners office for his Autopsy.

All of my indifference and detachment that I worked so hard to achieve over the years has just gone into the bowels of hell and right now I am gutted.

I am going to say now what I have never said before because I want the truth out there for once.

Our relationship was not “a sham” as is being reported in the press. It was an unusual relationship yes, where two unusual people who did not live or know a “normal life” found a connection, perhaps with some suspect timing on his part. Nonetheless, I do believe he loved me as much as he could love anyone and I loved him very much.

I wanted to “save him” I wanted to save him from the inevitable which is what has just happened.

His family and his loved ones also wanted to save him from this as well but didn’t know how and this was 14 years ago. We all worried that this would be the outcome then.

At that time, in trying to save him, I almost lost myself.

He was an incredibly dynamic force and power that was not to be underestimated.

When he used it for something good, it was the best and when he used it for something bad, it was really, REALLY bad.

Mediocrity was not a concept that would even for a second enter Michael Jackson’s being or actions.

I became very ill and emotionally/spiritually exhausted in my quest to save him from certain self-destructive behaviors and from the awful vampires and leeches he would always manage to magnetize around him.

I was in over my head while trying.

I had my children to care for, I had to make a decision.

The hardest decision I have ever had to make, which was to walk away and let his fate have him, even though I desperately loved him and tried to stop or reverse it somehow.

After the divorce, I spent a few years obsessing about him and what I could have done different, in regret.

Then I spent some angry years at the whole situation.

At some point, I truly became indifferent, until now.

As I sit here overwhelmed with sadness, reflection and confusion at what was my biggest failure to date, watching on the news almost play by play the exact scenario I saw happen on August 16th, 1977 happening again right now with Michael (A sight I never wanted to see again) just as he predicted, I am truly, truly gutted.

Any ill experience or words I have felt towards him in the past has just died inside of me along with him.

He was an amazing person and I am lucky to have gotten as close to him as I did and to have had the many experiences and years that we had together.

I desperately hope that he can be relieved from his pain, pressure and turmoil now.

He deserves to be free from all of that and I hope he is in a better place or will be.

I also hope that anyone else who feels they have failed to help him can be set free because he hopefully finally is.

The World is in shock but somehow he knew exactly how his fate would be played out some day more than anyone else knew, and he was right.

I really needed to say this right now, thanks for listening.”

Jackson gave a 90-minute interview with Oprah Winfrey in February 1993, his first television interview since 1979. He grimaced when speaking of his childhood abuse at the hands of his father; he believed he had missed out on much of his childhood years, admitting that he often cried from loneliness. He denied previous tabloid rumors that he bought the bones of the Elephant Man or slept in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. The entertainer went on to dispel suggestions that he bleached his skin, stating for the first time that he had vitiligo. The interview was watched by 90 million Americans, becoming the fourth most-viewed non-sport program in U.S. history. It also started a public debate on the topic of vitiligo, a relatively unknown condition before then. Dangerous re-entered the album chart top 10, more than a year after its original release.^[10][11][12]

Jackson was accused of child sexual abuse by a 13-year-old child named Jordan Chandler and his father Evan Chandler.^[83] The friendship between Jackson and Evan Chandler broke down. Sometime afterwards, Evan Chandler was tape-recorded saying amongst other things, "If I go through with this, I win big-time. There's no way I lose. I will get everything I want and they will be destroyed forever...Michael's career will be over".^[84] A year after they had met, under the influence of sodium amytal, a controversial sedative, Jordan Chandler told his father that Jackson had touched his penis.^[85] Evan Chandler and Jackson, represented by their legal teams, then engaged in unsuccessful negotiations to resolve the issue in a financial settlement; the negotiations were initiated by Chandler but Jackson did make several counter offers. Jordan Chandler then told a psychiatrist and later police that he and Jackson had engaged in acts of kissing, masturbation and oral sex, as well as giving a detailed description of what he alleged were the singer's genitals.^[86]

An official investigation began, with Jordan Chandler's mother adamant that there was no wrongdoing on Jackson's part. Neverland Ranch was searched; multiple children and family members denied that he was a pedophile.^[86] Jackson's image took a further turn for the worse when his older sister La Toya Jackson accused him of being a pedophile, a statement she later retracted.^[87] Jackson agreed to a 25-minute strip search, conducted at his ranch. The search was required to see if a description provided by Jordan Chandler was accurate. Doctors concluded that there were some strong similarities, but it was not a definitive match.^[87] Jackson made an emotional public statement on the events; he proclaimed his innocence, criticized what he perceived as biased media coverage and told of his strip search.^[83]

Jackson began taking painkillers, Valium and Ativan to help him cope with chronic pain, a consequence to an accident involving the collapse of stage rigging during the Dangerous Tour, and for joint inflammation from lupus. Jackson started taking Xanax for panic attacks and stress stemming from the allegations made against him of child abuse. By the fall of 1993, Jackson was addicted to the drugs.^[88] His health deteriorated to the extent that he canceled the remainder of the Dangerous World Tour and went into drug rehabilitation for a few months.^[89] The stress of the allegations also caused Jackson to stop eating, and he lost a significant amount of weight.^[90] With his health in decline, Jackson's friends and legal advisers took over his defense and finances; they called on him to settle the allegations out of court, believing that he could not endure a lengthy trial.^[89][90]

Michael Joseph Jackson was born August 29, 1958 in Gary, Indiana, an industrial suburb of Chicago.^[6] The son of African-American parents Joseph Walter "Joe" Jackson and Katherine Esther Scruse,^[6] he was the seventh of nine children. His siblings are Rebbie, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, La Toya, Marlon, Randy and Janet.^[6] Joseph Jackson was a steel mill employee who often performed in an R&B band called The Falcons with his brother Luther. Jackson was raised as a Jehovah's Witness by his devout mother.^[6]

Jackson stated that he was physically and emotionally abused by his father from a young age, enduring incessant rehearsals, whippings and name-calling. However, he also credited his father's strict discipline as playing a large part in his success.^[7][8] In one altercation—later recalled by Marlon Jackson—Joseph held Michael upside down by one leg and "pummeled him over and over again with his hand, hitting him on his back and buttocks".^[9] Joseph would also trip or push his male children into walls. One night while Jackson was asleep, Joseph climbed into his room through the bedroom window. Wearing a fright mask, he entered the room screaming and shouting. Joseph said he wanted to teach his children not to leave the window open when they went to sleep. For years afterwards, Jackson said he suffered nightmares about being kidnapped from his bedroom.^[9] In 2003, Joseph admitted to the BBC that he had whipped Jackson as a child.^[10]

Jackson first spoke openly about his childhood abuse in a 1993 interview with Oprah Winfrey. He said that during his childhood he often cried from loneliness and would sometimes start to vomit upon seeing his father.^{[11][12][13][14]} In Jackson's other high profile interview, Living with Michael Jackson (2003), the singer covered his face with his hand and began crying when talking about his childhood abuse.^[9] Jackson recalled that Joseph sat in a chair with a belt in his hand as he and his siblings rehearsed and that "if you didn't do it the right way, he would tear you up, really get you".^[15]

Jackson showed musical talent early in his life, performing in front of classmates and others during a Christmas recital at the age of five.^[6] In 1964, Jackson and Marlon joined the Jackson Brothers—a band formed by brothers Jackie, Tito and Jermaine—as backup musicians playing congas and tambourine, respectively. Jackson later began performing backup vocals and dancing; at the age of eight, he and Jermaine assumed lead vocals, and the group's name was changed to The Jackson 5.^[6] The band toured the Midwest extensively from 1966 to 1968. The band frequently performed at a string of black clubs and venues collectively known as the "chitlin' circuit", where they often opened for stripteases and other adult acts. In 1966, they won a major local talent show with renditions of Motown hits and James Brown's "I Got You (I Feel Good)", led by Michael.^[16]

Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American recording artist, entertainer and businessman. The seventh child of the Jackson family, he made his debut as an entertainer in 1968 as a member of The Jackson 5. He then began a solo career in 1971 while still a member of the group, and that successful career led to him being dubbed the "King of Pop"^[2] in subsequent years. Jackson's 1982 album Thriller remains the world's best-selling album of all time,^[3] and four of his other solo studio albums are among the world's best-selling records: Off the Wall (1979), Bad (1987), Dangerous (1991) and HIStory (1995).

In the early 1980s, he became a dominant figure in American popular music and culture. He was the first African American entertainer to amass a strong crossover following on MTV, with videos such as "Beat It", "Billie Jean" and "Thriller"—widely credited with transforming the music video from a promotional tool into an art form—bringing fame to the relatively new channel. Videos such as "Black or White" and "Scream" made Jackson an enduring staple on MTV well into the 1990s. Beyond his success on television, Jackson popularized a number of physically complicated dance techniques, such as the robot and the moonwalk, with his elaborate stage performances. His distinctive musical sound and vocal style influenced many hip hop, pop music and contemporary R&B artists across several generations.

Jackson donated and raised millions of dollars for beneficial causes through his Heal the World Foundation, charity singles, and support of 39 charities. Other aspects of his personal life, including his often changing appearances and eccentric behavior, generated significant controversy that damaged his public image. Though he was accused of child sexual abuse in 1993, the criminal investigation was closed due to lack of evidence and Jackson was not charged. The singer had experienced health concerns since the early 1990s along with conflicting reports regarding the state of his finances since the late 1990s. Jackson married twice and fathered three children, actions which caused further controversy. In 2005, during People v. Jackson, Jackson was tried and acquitted of different sexual abuse allegations and several other charges.