Jermaine Jackson says he regrets family feud

Jackson wrote in a statement first released to The Associated Press that he regrets the public turmoil that resulted from his mother Katherine’s 10-day trip to an Arizona spa. The trip sparked a missing person’s report and a driveway confrontation between relatives at the home of Katherine Jackson before a judge stripped her of guardianship duties.

“Mistakes have been made and irrational things have been said on both sides in a highly charged emotional environment,” Jermaine Jackson wrote. “It is time for us all to draw a line in the sand and move towards peace, co-operation, love and healing.”

The Jackson family is still raw from the death of the pop superstar three years ago, Jermaine Jackson wrote, and his mother has endured incredible stress and pressures since then.

He said he remains concerned about his brother’s estate but is dropping support for a letter leaked two weeks ago that called on executors of the estate to resign.

Jermaine Jackson said his statement was prompted after his son asked if he could no longer visit Katherine Jackson at her suburban Calabasas home.

“After much soul-searching, it is clearly time for us to live by Michael’s words about love not war,” he wrote.

At the request of an attorney for TJ Jackson, temporary guardian of Michael Jackson’s children, the estate has acknowledged it has blocked certain relatives from visiting the home. The family members were not named.

Attorneys are still trying to untangle some of the issues that the family dispute has created. Katherine Jackson’s attorney Perry Sanders Jr. said attorneys will return to court Thursday to present an agreement to restore his client as a guardian.

The agreement would also call for TJ Jackson to remain a co-guardian, with control over the staff and day-to-day operations of the home where Katherine Jackson and her grandchildren Prince, Paris and Blanket currently live. Sanders has said the arrangement will allow Katherine Jackson to focus on the children’s upbringing and not on other financial or logistics issues.

The co-guardianship arrangement would also allow either Katherine Jackson, 82, or TJ Jackson, 34, to serve as sole guardian if the other were no longer able to serve.

Jermaine Jackson’s statement offers a detailed account of why he, brother Randy and sisters Janet and Rebbie felt it was necessary to isolate their mother recently.

“We simply worried that a call home would first entail, or lead to, conversations with individuals we are in dispute with and that would, therefore, increase pressure on Mother — and pressure was what a doctor said she didn’t need,” he wrote.

He said by the time of the driveway confrontation on July 23, “it was clear that mutual suspicions had allowed events to spiral out of control.” He said that he, Randy and Janet Jackson went to the Calabasas home try to talk to the children.

“I regret that events were ever allowed to reach such a stage,” he wrote. “I regret any distress caused to Prince, Paris and Blanket. That was never, ever the intention of myself, Janet, Rebbie or Randy.”