Michael Jackson Estate: Will, Executors, Value and Court Fights (2026)

By Eric Ridley, attorney, Ridley Law. Updated October 2026.

This page follows what courts and major news outlets have reported about Michael Jackson’s estate: the 2002 will and trust, the executors, the fight with the IRS over what he left, and the family disputes over who runs it. Each fact comes from a court opinion or a named outlet, and the sentence says which. Where one side made a claim and a court hasn’t decided it, the page says so and stops there.

What was Michael Jackson’s net worth when he died?

He had no single net worth at death, because he owned valuable music rights and owed a great deal against them. Forbes reported in April 2026 that Jackson had at least $450 million in debt when he died in June 2009. The Tax Court later valued three of his biggest assets at about $111.5 million combined, against about $481.9 million in the IRS’s valuations.

What you’re measuring	Figure	Who reported it
Debt at death	At least $450 million, including $40 million owed to the tour promoter AEG Live	Forbes, April 2026
Debt and creditor claims against his most significant assets	More than $500 million	The executors’ 2024 court filing, as reported by NBC News
Assets and debt in his own financial statement	$567.6 million in assets and $331 million in debt as of March 31, 2007	Documents obtained by the AP, per NBC News (July 2009)
Three disputed assets at death, valued by the Tax Court	About $111.5 million combined ($4,153,912 for his image and likeness, $0 for New Horizon Trust II and $107,313,561 for New Horizon Trust III)	U.S. Tax Court, May 2021
The same three assets, valued by the IRS	About $481.9 million combined ($161,307,045, $206,295,934 and $114,263,615)	Same Tax Court opinion
Earnings after death	More than $3.5 billion since 2009, by Forbes’ estimate	Forbes, October 2025

The combined figures for the three assets are my arithmetic on the opinion’s numbers, and they cover only those assets, not the whole estate. The later earnings aren’t part of his net worth at death. They came from deals the executors made after he died, including the 2016 sale of the estate’s half of Sony/ATV for $750 million, and Forbes says a large share of that money went to taxes, debts and legal fights. The trust splits what remains among his mother, his three children and charities, as the next section explains.

Who inherited Michael Jackson’s money?

His mother, his three children and charities, according to ABC News, CNN, Forbes and the Tax Court.

ABC News reported on July 2, 2009, citing a source close to the estate, that the trust splits his assets 40 percent to Katherine Jackson, 40 percent to his three children and 20 percent to children’s charities to be named later. CNN reported the same chief beneficiaries and a 20 percent charity share in October 2009, and Forbes wrote in April 2026 that the will leaves 20 percent to charity with the rest split between his mother and three children. The Tax Court’s description is less exact. A footnote says Jackson left “a very large portion” to charities and divided the rest almost entirely between his mother and his children, with his mother’s share held in trust for her lifetime and the remainder going to his children. The trust itself isn’t public, so I can’t reconcile “a very large portion” with 20 percent. The percentages come from a source close to the estate, not from a court filing.

His father and siblings take nothing, ABC reported. When Joe Jackson tried to challenge the executors, Judge Beckloff told his lawyer, “Joe Jackson takes none of this estate. This is a decision his son made,” CBS News reported in November 2009.

Did Michael Jackson have a will?

Yes. Jackson signed a will in 2002 that named John Branca and John McClain as executors, according to the U.S. Tax Court’s 2021 opinion in Estate of Michael J. Jackson v. Commissioner.

Nobody knew that at first. The Tax Court wrote that Jackson died unexpectedly at 50 and “nobody even knew if there was a will.” A business associate named Tohme Tohme claimed he held a post-death power of attorney, which added to the confusion, the court said. Then “a search was made, and a will was found.” ABC News reported on July 2, 2009 that the will had been filed in a Los Angeles courthouse. It gave custody of his three children to his mother, Katherine Jackson, named singer Diana Ross as the alternate if Katherine died first, and stated that his ex-wife Debbie Rowe was “intentionally omitted,” ABC reported.

The will doesn’t say who gets what. ABC reported that the distribution terms sit in a separate trust document and that all of Jackson’s assets were to be placed in the Michael Jackson Family Trust, with Branca, McClain and accountant Barry Siegel named as executors of the trust. ABC reported, citing a statement from the named trustees, that Siegel resigned as trustee in 2003. This is the pour-over structure: the will is a public court filing, and the trust terms usually stay private. ABC quoted Los Angeles estate lawyer Andy Katzenstein saying so about celebrity living trusts. See how a pour-over will works and the pour-over will definition.

Who controls Michael Jackson’s estate?

John Branca, Jackson’s longtime entertainment lawyer, and John McClain, a music executive and childhood friend, are the co-executors, according to the Tax Court and NBC News in 2026.

The Tax Court said McClain was still co-executor at trial but was dealing with health problems, and Branca took on most of the work. Branca’s first goal, the court wrote, was to avoid foreclosure on Jackson’s assets. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff approved both men as executors on November 10, 2009, CNN reported, after Katherine Jackson dropped her challenge to them (more on that below). NBC News described the two as the producers of the Jackson biopic and the co-executors of the estate in March 2026.

How much was Michael Jackson’s estate worth when he died?

The answer depends on who is counting. The estate’s tax return, the executors, the IRS and the Tax Court each gave a different number, on top of the figures in the net worth table above.

Measure	Figure	Who reported it
Taxable estate on the estate’s tax return	About $7 million	NBC News in 2013, from the estate’s filing (NBC News)
Image and likeness on the 2009 estate tax return	$2,105	Tax Court (opinion)
Estimated value in the executors’ 2009 petition	At least $500 million	CNN (CNN)
Debt, per a probate filing covering June 2009 to December 2010	More than $400 million	CBS News and the AP (CBS News)
Additional estate tax the IRS asserted in May 2013, plus penalties	$505.1 million plus $196.9 million	NBC News in 2013 (NBC News)

The numbers differ because the estate held assets that were hard to value and heavily mortgaged. ABC reported that the court papers described the estate as consisting almost entirely of “non-cash, non-liquid assets,” and the Tax Court found that each of the three assets in dispute was distressed when Jackson died. CBS News reported in 2009, citing an unnamed person briefed on the matter, that the estate’s actual worth was about $100 million at the time even though court papers described it as worth more than $500 million.

How did the estate pay off Michael Jackson’s debts?

Through a run of deals the executors made after his death, starting with the concert film “This Is It” and ending with the 2016 sale of the estate’s half of Sony/ATV for $750 million, according to the Tax Court and NBC News.

At his death, the Tax Court found, the debt was heavy. His interest in Sony/ATV secured $303 million of loans that matured in less than 18 months. His interest in Mijac Music secured more than $72 million of debt. AEG Live, the tour promoter, claimed about $36 million and wanted it immediately. His business manager counted $450 million in “easily identifiable debt.” The executors’ 2024 petition put AEG’s claim at $40 million and said more than 65 creditor claims were filed, most of which the executors have since settled or resolved, NBC News reported.

Deal	What was reported	Source
“This Is It” film (2009)	Branca asked the probate court to approve the rehearsal-footage agreement. Katherine Jackson filed a response arguing AEG didn’t own the footage, and the court granted the petition in its entirety. The film grossed more than $240 million by July 2011. The estate began receiving money in April 2010 and had received $45 million by the end of July.	Tax Court
Sony Music albums (2009)	The estate agreed in November 2009 to deliver 10 posthumous albums between October 2009 and December 2016.	Tax Court
Bravado merchandise (2009)	Bravado paid the estate a $10 million recoupable advance. It recouped its advances only after five years.	Tax Court
Cirque du Soleil (2010 on)	Cirque agreed to fund two shows, a touring show that premiered in October 2011 and a Las Vegas show that premiered in June 2013. Branca thought the touring show earned the estate $20 million to $25 million.	Tax Court
First 18 months	A probate filing showed the estate earned more than $310 million from June 2009 through December 2010 and spent more than $159 million.	CBS News and AP
Sony/ATV sale (2016)	Sony agreed to buy the estate’s half of the Sony/ATV catalog for $750 million. The sale did not include Jackson’s master recordings or the songs he wrote.	NBC News and AP

The estate’s own account in 2026 is bigger. Its lawyers wrote in a March 19, 2026 court filing that Branca and McClain made the estate billions of dollars through a concert documentary, a Broadway musical and a Cirque du Soleil show, according to NBC News. That figure is the estate’s description of its own performance. I haven’t found a court ruling or audited accounting in the outlets I loaded that confirms a total.

Why was Michael Jackson’s estate in Tax Court?

Because the IRS said the estate undervalued three assets by hundreds of millions of dollars, and the estate disagreed, according to the Tax Court’s 2021 opinion.

The estate’s 2009 estate tax return reported Jackson’s image and likeness at $2,105, New Horizon Trust II (which held his half of Sony/ATV) at $0 and New Horizon Trust III (which held Mijac Music, a catalog of songs he wrote or co-wrote) at $2,207,351. The IRS audited the return and issued a notice of deficiency in May 2013. The court said the IRS concluded the estate had underpaid by “a shade more than $500 million” and added penalties of nearly $200 million. The estate petitioned. By trial the parties had settled most disputes and were fighting over only these three assets. The court tried the case in Los Angeles and noted that Jackson was domiciled in California when he died.

Judge Holmes issued the opinion on May 3, 2021. The opinion’s closing table shows where the three sides ended up:

Asset	Estate	IRS (Commissioner)	Tax Court
Jackson’s image and likeness	$3,078,000	$161,307,045	$4,153,912
New Horizon Trust II (NHT II)	$0	$206,295,934	$0
New Horizon Trust III (NHT III)	$2,267,316	$114,263,615	$107,313,561

The estate won on NHT II and came close on the image and likeness. The IRS won most of its number on NHT III, the Mijac catalog. The court found no penalties. It said Moss Adams, the accounting firm that valued the image and likeness and Mijac for the return, was reputable and credible, and that the estate reasonably relied on those appraisals in good faith even though the court disagreed with the values. The opinion ends with the line “Decision will be entered under Rule 155,” which means the parties still had to compute the final tax from these values. I haven’t found a later reported opinion in that case.

The court valued each asset as it stood “in the decedent’s hands at the time of its transfer by death,” and acknowledged that the values it set were “much less than their value much later under the Estate’s management.” Jackson’s finances, the court wrote, had made bankruptcy a foreseeable outcome. That is why the numbers look so low next to the later deals.

What was Michael Jackson’s image and likeness worth when he died?

$4,153,912, according to the Tax Court, using the estate’s experts’ revenue projections and a 15.4 percent discount rate.

In 2009, even as Jackson sold out concerts, the court found, exploitation of his name and likeness earned him only $24. The court said he made almost no money from his name and likeness in the last decade of his life. It adopted the estate experts’ projection that revenue would peak in year three, fall 10 to 17 percent a year from years four to ten, and then fall 5 percent a year through year 70 of his statutory image-and-likeness right, which the opinion discusses under California Civil Code section 3344.1. The court agreed with the estate’s expert that Jackson’s rights at death were worth no more than Marilyn Monroe’s, because Monroe’s reputation was not burdened by allegations of child abuse. The court said it was making no judgment about what Jackson did or was alleged to have done. It had to decide how those allegations affected the value of what he left. The IRS’s expert, the court found, valued the wrong assets, counted opportunities nobody could foresee at death (the Cirque du Soleil shows and the Broadway musical among them) and made faulty calculations.

Year	Projected revenue	Expenses	Projected income	Present value at 15.4%
1	$2,500,000	$1,740,000	$760,000	$707,474
2	$2,750,000	$1,890,000	$860,000	$693,729
3	$3,000,000	$2,040,000	$960,000	$671,053
4	$2,750,000	$1,890,000	$860,000	$520,929
5	$2,500,000	$1,740,000	$760,000	$398,922
6	$2,250,000	$1,590,000	$660,000	$300,201
7	$2,000,000	$1,440,000	$560,000	$220,724
8	$1,750,000	$1,290,000	$460,000	$157,114
9	$1,500,000	$1,140,000	$360,000	$106,550
10	$1,250,000	$990,000	$260,000	$66,683
Years 1-10 subtotal				$3,843,378
Years 11-70, declining 5% a year				$310,533
Total				$4,153,912

The court noted that some of its figures differ by small amounts because of rounding in the spreadsheet it used.

Estate tax is computed on date-of-death value, so this valuation is the one that counted. For decedents dying in 2009, the IRS’s Form 706 instructions put the applicable exclusion amount at $3,500,000. The 2026 basic exclusion amount is $15,000,000, according to the IRS. California has no estate tax of its own. See California estate tax in 2026 and estate and inheritance tax in California.

Did Katherine Jackson challenge the executors?

Yes, for about four months in 2009, and then she dropped it, according to CNN.

Her lawyers raised questions about conflicts of interest and asked that a Jackson family member “have a seat at the table” as a third executor, CNN reported in October 2009. In September 2009, Judge Beckloff ruled that her challenge to the executors “would not be a contest within the meaning of the Trust’s no contest clause,” so she wouldn’t risk her inheritance by bringing it, CNN reported. A trial on the executors’ fitness was set for mid-November. In October she replaced her lawyers with probate attorney Adam Streisand. On November 10, 2009 Streisand told the court Katherine Jackson “feels it’s high time that the fighting ends” and thought Branca and McClain “have been doing an admirable job.” The judge then approved both men as executors.

That hearing was also where Joe Jackson’s separate challenge ended. His lawyer, Brian Oxman, argued the executors had hidden a mistake about where the will said it was signed. The judge ruled that only a beneficiary could bring that challenge, CNN reported. Joe Jackson separately asked for a monthly allowance from the estate, and CNN reported the judge would hear that request on December 10, 2009. I haven’t loaded a report of how it came out.

Court papers made public in September 2009 showed Katherine Jackson and the three children received a combined allowance of more than $86,000 a month, CNN reported, and a later document showed the estate paid $1,098,000 for Jackson’s funeral and burial.

If you’re weighing a similar challenge in California, the no-contest clause rules and the difference between a trust contest and a will contest decide whether challenging a fiduciary puts your inheritance at risk.

What are Paris, Prince and Bigi Jackson fighting the executors about?

Paris Jackson has asked a Los Angeles court for more transparency and faster accountings from Branca and McClain, and her brothers have joined her, NBC News reported in March 2026.

According to NBC News, Paris’s lawyers filed a petition in November 2025 accusing the estate of becoming “the vehicle for John Branca to enrich and aggrandize himself, rather than serve the beneficiaries’ best interests and steadfastly preserve her father’s legacy.” That is her side’s allegation. The estate’s lawyers answered in a March 19, 2026 filing that her objections are “without merit.” Their attorney, Jonathan Steinsapir, told NBC that Paris “has already received roughly $65 million in benefits and stands to inherit many hundreds of millions more,” and that most of her claims were already approved by her own legal team or by the court in prior accountings. Paris’s lawyers answered in a March 16 filing that the estate gave no calculation for the $65 million figure, which Paris “disputes as outright false,” and that the executors had received total compensation of $148,252,657 through the end of 2021.

The only court action NBC reported was procedural. A judge approved a schedule for the estate to submit its expenses and allowed Branca and McClain to wait until April 2027 to report their 2025 accounting. No court had decided whether the executors breached any duty as of that report, and I haven’t found a later report from a named outlet. Treat every number in this dispute as one side’s claim.

Late accountings aren’t new. In June 2024 the executors petitioned the Los Angeles court to reimburse their attorneys for legal services and expenses in 2018, NBC News reported. California executors owe the court and the beneficiaries accountings like these. See how California executors and trustees get paid and trust accounting requirements.

What this means for your own plan

• Make sure someone can find the original will. The Tax Court said that when Jackson died nobody knew if there was one. See what to do if you can’t find the original will and the legal requirements for a valid California will.
• Put the terms in a trust if you want them private. A will is filed with the court. Trust terms usually aren’t. See trust funding in California and the trust funding checklist.
• Name fiduciaries you will still want in 15 years. Jackson’s executors have served since 2009 and are still in court over how they do it. See how to choose a trustee and successor trustee.
• Know the date-of-death value problem. The IRS and the Tax Court were $157 million apart on one asset ($161.3 million against $4.2 million). If you own a business, a catalog or a brand, see estate tax planning and California’s posthumous publicity rights.
• Say who can challenge what. The judge allowed Katherine Jackson’s challenge but not Joe Jackson’s because only a beneficiary had standing. Your documents decide who qualifies. See no-contest clauses in California trusts.
• Get the basics done first. If you die without a will, the state writes the plan. See what happens if you die without a will in California.

Missing documents, unclear authority and family members who disagree show up in estates of every size. If your plan is old or unfunded, talk to Ridley Law about a review.

Michael Jackson estate: quick answers

Is Michael Jackson’s estate still in probate?

Yes. NBC News reported on March 27, 2026 that the estate had been in probate for 17 years, with a pending dispute over accountings.

Did Michael Jackson leave anything to his father?

No. ABC News reported the will and trust left nothing to Joe Jackson or Jackson’s siblings, and the probate judge told Joe Jackson’s lawyer in 2009 that Joe Jackson “takes none of this estate,” CBS News reported.

Is Michael Jackson’s will public?

The will was filed in a Los Angeles courthouse in 2009 and was reported on by ABC News. ABC reported that the trust’s specifics “may never be made public.”

Did the IRS win its tax case against the estate?

Mostly not on value. The Tax Court valued the image and likeness at $4,153,912 against the IRS’s $161,307,045, and valued NHT II at zero. On NHT III it set $107,313,561 against the IRS’s $114,263,615. It imposed no penalties.