I do not think he molested that kid. I never did. I was not a diehard MJ fan while he was alive, but just have common sense. What you have to understand is mega celebs have to be very cautious about the company they keep. MJ was the single biggest celebrity on the entire planet. People wanted to be around him just because he was Michael Jackson.
The majority of people with whom he associated only saw him as a moneybags. This served, in part, to mess him up like he was. He never really knew who was a genuine friend, and who was after a quick buck. One reason he enjoyed keeping company with children was because they did not care about his money.
MJ genuinely loved children. This has a lot to do with his maturity being stunted due to several factors, including having to behave as an adult while still a child. Regardless, he gave and gave generously because he truly wanted to help kids. He opened up his personal property to sick kids by turning it into an amusement park without a single paying guest.
OJ murdered two innocent people. He got away with it due to playing the race card and flipping the tables on the LAPD (because he had the money to hire the best possible lawyers who could manipulate the jury). I knew OJ would go free ONLY because there is no way a mostly white jury would convict him right on the heels of the Rodney King-spurned LA riots. OJ Simpson got a very fair trial. The families of the murder victims did not get a fair trial. I am puzzled as to why people are quick to compare MJ to OJ. Is it because they are both black and famous? That is about the only connection between them.
Several factors are at play as to why MJ paid that first kid off. Regardless of how generous he was, or how talented he was at producing great pop music, the general perception of MJ, even in the early '90's, was that he was an eccentric freak. He was turning whiter and whiter before our eyes, and having extensive plastic surgery to alter his features.
Any trial is a gamble. It is very easy for someone who has never been falsely accused to say, "Why would you pay someone off if you didn't do it?" The fact that Neverland Ranch was a mecca for children would not have faired well at a trial. Jackson admitted to having sleepovers with kids, another fact that a jury would have to take into account.
Jackson had thousands of children at his ranch over the years. It was only a matter of time before one of the parents was going to cry foul in order to chase his fat wallet. While I do not believe MJ ever touched a child, the deck would have been stacked against him at trial. He had the money to just make the situation go away, and that is what he did.
See, Jackson was not a sexual person. He had no interest in sex, with children, with men, with women, not even with his wives. He viewed these sleepovers as normal, since he was a grown child himself. Since he was a rich and famous man, he was granted more leniency than a "normal" person would be. He DID give back to kids. He DID donate money to causes. He DID do good things for children. He was Michael Jackson, and therefore he could get away with things that anybody else could not.
It makes perfect sense that he paid this first kid off. He wanted the situation to disappear. He did not want to bother with a trial. It would have been very expensive, time-consuming, and a gamble.
His closest advisers told him again and again and again to change his patterns of behavior after that first incident. Since MJ KNEW he would never harm a child, he continued doing what he had been doing, having the sleepovers, etc. Again, it was only a matter of time before another money-hungry parent came after him. This time he refused to take it lying down, and went ahead with a trial. He was found not guilty. This was not because he was rich and famous and could hire the best lawyers, like OJ. This was because THERE WAS NO EVIDENCE AT ALL THAT HE DID ANYTHING criminally WRONG! A grown man (by age) should never host children in his own bed, even bedroom, but this does not mean he molested anyone. In his childlike mindset, it was okay to have sleepovers with the kids he loved so much.
The public find this extremely inappropriate and it is. That is why his closest advisers told him to stop. The man did not have a sexual bone in his body. It was of no interest to him.
The other clear issue is, if MJ really did molest that child, then why would the parents accept a payout? It seems as though the parent would want to act in the best interest of children, and get a pedophile locked away. That by itself is questionable, though, since no matter what people may say, everybody has a price.