Prince Michael: My dad used to cry

Michael Jackson sometimes cried after talking to AEG Live executives as he prepared for his comeback shows, his eldest son has told a court.

Prince Michael Jackson told jurors his father wanted more time to rehearse, and had had several tense phone conversations with the promoters of his This Is It shows.

Those conversations sometimes ended with his father in tears, he said. "After he got off the phone, he would cry," Prince testified.

"He would say 'They're going to kill me, they're going to kill me'."

The teenager, his sister, Paris and brother, Blanket are plaintiffs in a case that seeks to hold AEG financially responsible for their father's death.

The lawsuit claims AEG negligently hired Dr Conrad Murray, who was later convicted of involuntary manslaughter for giving Jackson an overdose of the anaesthetic propofol.

AEG denies any wrongdoing.

Prince, who is 16, is the first member of the family to have testified. The teenager showed jurors 15 minutes of private family photos and home videos as he described growing up on his father's Neverland Ranch and elsewhere.

He told the jury he had no idea his father was a global superstar. "We always listened to his music, but we never knew how famous he was," Prince said.

He said he and his sister watched a video of one of their father's performances and got a sense of his fame when overwhelmed fans were carried from his shows on stretchers.

One image shown to jurors showed Michael Jackson playing a piano with Prince while he was still an infant.

The teenager said rather than following in his father's footsteps, he wants to study film or business when he goes to college.

"I can never play an instrument and I definitely cannot sing," Prince said to laughter from the jury.

Michael Jackson sheltered his children from the public eye, often obscuring their faces while out in public. The children have been more public since his death in 2009.

Paris, 15, had also been expected to testify during the case, but last month, she was taken to hospital after an apparent suicide attempt and her status as a witness remained unclear.

Blanket, 11, is not expected to testify at the trial, which will last many more weeks.

Credit: skynews