The family of an elderly California woman has accused Michael Jackson of outrageously abusing his celebrity status by having her kicked out of her hospital bed so he could take refuge from his child molestation trial two years ago, On Point has learned.

Jackson was admitted Feb. 15, 2005 to Marian Medical Center in Santa Maria, Calif., after complaining of “flu-like symptoms.” The hospitalization caused a hiatus in jury selection at his trial – and, according to the latest addition to his litany of legal troubles, devastated the family of 74-year-old Manuela Ruiz.

“Michael Jackson’s trumped-up admission to the Trauma Room ... [was] a tragic play that allowed Michael Jackson to ease his nerves in avoiding court while forever traumatizing the Plaintiffs, watching the final hours of their mother’s life,” a complaint filed in Santa Barbara County Superior Court says.

Ruiz, who had suffered a heart attack, was allegedly being treated in a two-bed trauma room –- the hospital's most acute care facility -- when Jackson and his entourage arrived. Even though she “posed no 'privacy' risk” for Jackson, her family says, nurses disconnected her from life support machines and “hustled” her out of the room.

“[T]he Hospital's covert 'VIP' policy efficiently and swiftly clear-cut the way for Michael Jackson's need for 'privacy',” the plaintiffs allege.

Amid “confusion and chaos,” Ruiz allegedly ended up in a small examination room, where she had another heart attack. She died later that day –- by which time Jackson had been moved to the empty pediatric unit.

The plaintiffs are not suing for wrongful death or medical malpractice. But they are claiming unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for intentional infliction of emotional distress, which requires them to prove the defendants' conduct was “unacceptable and intolerable ... in a civilized society.”

Jackson met that high standard, the suit contends, by “transforming the Hospital, purportedly caring for the sick and dying, into an extension of [his] Neverland carnival park.” The hospital, meanwhile, is liable for "abandoning its obligations to a critically ill patient."

The severity of Jackson's symptoms could be a key issue in the case. At the time of his admission, a hospital official said he was tested for “a flu-like illness with some vomiting.”

The Ruiz family claims that medical records will show he not only did not require placement in the trauma room, but that “he should not have been admitted to the Hospital at all … having been told during admission that he could just as well go home!”

2/16/07