Michael Jackson Estate Wants $1M in Allegedly Stolen Memorabilia Back

Months after the estate of Michael Jackson first publicly alleged that a man once engaged to the late star’s older sister had stolen his property, it is now actively seeking the return of the items. The estate has estimated the worth of the allegedly stolen property to be around $1 million, according to court records obtained by TMZ on Tuesday. It accuses Jeffré Phillips, who dated La Toya Jackson for years, of taking advantage of the family’s grief in the days following MJ’s death to purloin the items from his Carolwood home. Describing Phillip’s “brazen acts of theft” in a June lawsuit, the estate claims he snatched iPods, prescription pill bottles, handwritten notes, unreleased concert footage, and “the pajamas Jackson was wearing in the final hours of his life.” The estate claimed it only discovered the alleged thievery last December, when a tipster alerted its co-executors that Phillips was nosing around the possibility of auctioning the items. The sale was successfully blocked in August. Phillips has maintained that he did not steal the property, telling a court around that time that it was “given to me and belongs to me.”