Michael Jackson has closed the house on his Neverland Ranch and laid off some of the employees there but has not completely shuttered the sprawling estate, the pop star's spokesman said.
"It is public knowledge that Mr. Jackson currently resides in the Middle Eastern country of Bahrain," Jackson spokeswoman Raymone K. Bain said late Thursday in a statement. "He therefore decided to close his house and reduce his workforce," she added.
The action came a day after state labor officials announced that Jackson had agreed to pay his Neverland Ranch employees hundreds of thousands of dollars in back wages, avoiding a lawsuit by the California Department of Industrial Relations.
Employees who received their back pay on Thursday were told they were being laid off because the state had shut down the ranch. But Bain indicated the ranch was still operating, at least on a limited basis. "Reports indicating that Neverland has been closed or 'shut down' for good are inaccurate," she said in her statement.
Bain's statement, which did not indicate what plans Jackson has for the estate's future, concluded: "There will be no further comments regarding this matter."
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