Final family farewell to Jackson is delayed

Michael Jackson’s family has announced that its final farewell to the late “King of Pop” will be at a Los Angeles funeral on September 3, not August 29, as had been announced.

The ceremony, which the family said would be strictly limited to relatives and close friends of the star, will be held at 07:00 pm (0200 GMT) at The Great Mausoleum at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.

On Tuesday, the Jackson family had announced that Jackson’s funeral would be held on August 29, the day the singer would have turned 51.

The family did not say why the date was changed.

Modeled on a famed Italian cemetery, the Grand Mausoleum at Forest Lawn is protected with multiple security cameras and access is carefully regulated.

The public part of the site contains a reproduction of Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting The Last Supper, as well as multiple copies of statues by Michelangelo.

Michael Jackson died June 25, aged 50, in Los Angeles after suffering cardiac arrest — but the cause of his death remains unclear and police are investigating.

The enquiry has focused on Jackson’s dependence on multiple strong painkillers, including some that were provided by his doctor Conrad Murray, who has become a target of the police investigation into the singer’s death.

-AFP