Los Angeles, July 13 (DPA) Michael Jackson’s mother is in negotiations with his former wife, who is also the mother of his two older children, to settle a potential custody battle, ABC News reported Monday.
In his will, the late superstar named his mother Katherine Jackson, 79, as the guardian of his children, with pop diva Diana Ross as an alternate. However, legal experts say that his ex-wife Debbie Rowe, who is the children’s birth mother, has a strong legal
claim for custody.
The mother of Jackson’s third child, Blanket, 7, is unknown.
A custody hearing that had been scheduled for Monday has been postponed for a week.
Sources told ABC News that Rowe is willing to forego a fight for the children if their grandmother, Katherine Jackson, allows her more time to visit and guarantees that their grandfather, Joe Jackson, whom Michael accused of abuse, would never be named a guardian.
Though still legally married, Katherine lives apart from Joe Jackson, who has been talking up the show business skills of the Jackson children amid speculation that he might try to form them into a band called the Jackson 3.
Michael Jackson died June 25, aged 50, of cardiac arrest.