Jackson accuser’s mother concludes defiant testimony

Santa Maria, Calif. — Michael Jackson’s attorney on Tuesday challenged the authenticity of photographs that appeared to show the mother of the pop star’s accuser with severe bruises from an alleged beating by store security guards.

The woman’s family received a settlement of more than $150,000 over the 1998 store incident. The episode is unrelated to the child-molestation case against Jackson, but the singer’s lawyers have seized on it to argue that the family has a history of making false claims for money.

Defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. attacked the photos, introduced by the prosecution late Monday, by asking the woman when the pictures were taken. She said immediately — her then-husband wanted to document her injuries.

“But didn’t you testify that you didn’t have these bruises immediately?” asked Mesereau.

She fumbled for words and said she had been doing everything at the instruction of a defense attorney after she was arrested on suspicion of assault and battery, burglary and petty theft — charges that were eventually dropped.

Mesereau asked whether she told a woman at a law office that the bruises that were photographed were actually from a beating by her former husband.

“That’s incorrect,” she said during her fifth and final day on the stand.

The woman said that although she claimed to have been beaten and sexually touched during the altercation with the store guards, she did not decide to sue until a year later. Mesereau then suggested that was the pattern she was following in the Jackson case.

Asked about the case as he left court, Jackson simply said, “I think it’s going well, thank you.”

Jackson, 46, is accused of molesting one of the woman’s sons — a teenage cancer patient — in 2003, giving the boy alcohol and conspiring to hold the boy’s family captive to get them to rebut a damaging TV documentary about Jackson.

The woman also maintained that she never asked comedian George Lopez for money, nor did she approach Jay Leno.

Wedding bells, part one

They fell in love on TV, and their nuptials will be shown on TV.

A two-hour prime-time special on the wedding of Rob Mariano and Amber Brkich, who were cast members on CBS’ “Survivor All-Stars,” will air at 8 p.m. May 24, the network announced Tuesday.

“Rob and Amber Get Married” will document the planning, the bachelor and bachelorette parties, and the wedding ceremony, which was Saturday in the Bahamas.

Mariano proposed to Brkich on the live finale of “Survivor All-Stars” in May 2004. Since she wore a shirt proclaiming, “I (heart) Rob,” the answer wasn’t in much doubt.

She beat Mariano by just one vote to win the reality show’s $1 million prize,

They are now contestants on the seventh season of CBS’ “The Amazing Race.”

Wedding bells, part two

Santa Monica, Calif.– Sophia Bush and Chad Michael Murray, co-stars of the TV series “One Tree Hill,” have tied the knot.

They were married Saturday in a seaside ceremony at the Hotel Casa Del Mar in Santa Monica, Bush’s publicist, Sarah Fuller, said Monday.

Bush, 22, and Murray, 23, met in 2003 while filming the WB series. She plays feisty cheerleader Brooke Davis, and Murray plays Lucas Scott, a brooding intellectual struggling to find peace.

They were engaged last year. Murray has said he proposed while they were in Australia, where he was finishing work on the “House of Wax” movie.

“I had a bunch of roses and I put lights down on a tennis court that spelled something out for her,” he said at the time, declining to say what the message read.

“House of Wax” debuts May 6. Bush stars in this summer’s “Supercross.”

Must be something in the air

Los Angeles — “Growing Pains” father Alan Thicke is headed to the altar again.

Thicke, 58, will wed his longtime girlfriend, Tanya Callau, in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, on May 7, his publicist said Monday.

It will be the third marriage for Thicke, who played TV dad Jason Seaver on ABC’s “Growing Pains,” which ran from 1985 to 1992.

“I’ll be on my third honeymoon, so I’m more of an authority than I care to be,” Thicke joked in a statement.

Thicke had a cameo in the 2004 film “Childstar” and is producing and writing a television pilot called “Second Honeymoon.”

McCartney plans U.S. tour

New York — Paul McCartney is ready to rock the United States — again.

McCartney’s “US” tour will open Sept. 16 in Miami. The 28-performance tour spans 11 weeks, ending with a Nov. 29 show in Los Angeles.

“We are looking forward to playing again in America,” McCartney said in a statement Monday.

In the Midwest, concert sites planned so far include Des Moines, Iowa, and Omaha, Neb. Tickets go on sale Saturday at www.ticketmaster. com.