Nation in brief

Jackson was not mistreated, sheriff says

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - The Santa Barbara County sheriff Wednesday strongly denied Michael Jackson was roughed up by jailers during his arrest and threatened to press charges against the pop star for making a false accusation against an officer.

Sheriff Jim Anderson said he asked the state attorney general to investigate the allegations Jackson leveled during an interview on Sunday's 60 Minutes.

Jackson was treated "with the utmost respect and courtesy" during his arrest and booking Nov. 20 on suspicion of child molestation and was "in no way manhandled or abused," Anderson said at a news conference.

The sheriff said that Jackson raised no complaints during the process, thanked authorities when it was over, whistled and sang during the ride to jail, and replied, "Wonderful" when asked at one point how he was doing.

Anderson said he considers Jackson's allegations in the interview to be a formal citizen's complaint. He said that if the attorney general finds Jackson's accusations to be groundless, he will file a misdemeanor complaint against the singer for making a false report.

Attorney General Bill Lockyer issued a statement saying he had ordered an investigation. He said he did not know how long it would take.

Jackson said during the interview that he was bruised and his shoulder was dislocated because of jailers' rough treatment, and that he was locked in a feces-smeared restroom for 45 minutes after he asked to use the facilities.

The sheriff said it was not a bathroom but an empty holding cell big enough for seven people, and it had been cleaned just before Jackson asked to use it.

Jackson attorney Mark Geragos said after the sheriff's news conference that his client "absolutely" stands by his allegations, and that the idea of seeking criminal charges of a false report "shows another serious flaw in their knowledge of the law."

Jackson, 45, is charged with repeatedly molesting a boy who had stayed over at his Neverland estate. He is free on $3-million bail and has said he is innocent.

Also Wednesday, CBS denied a published report that the company paid Jackson for the 60 Minutes interview.

The New York Times, quoting an unidentified Jackson associate, said Wednesday that Jackson was paid $1-million to reschedule an entertainment special that had been postponed in November. The special, Michael Jackson Number Ones, will air Friday.

LONDON - The United States gave serious consideration to sending airborne troops to seize oil fields in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Abu Dhabi during the 1973 Arab oil embargo, according to a top-secret British intelligence memorandum released Wednesday evening.

The document, titled "Middle East - Possible Use of Force by the United States," said that if faced with deteriorating conditions such as a breakdown of the cease-fire between Arab and Israeli forces after the October 1973 Mideast War or an intensification of the embargo, "we believe the American preference would be for a rapid operation conducted by themselves" to seize the oil fields.

Seizure of the oil fields, the memo said, was "the possibility uppermost in American thinking (and) has been reflected, we believe, in their contingency planning."

The document, dated Dec. 13, 1973, and sent to Prime Minister Edward Heath by Percy Cradock, head of Britain's Joint Intelligence Committee, went on to discuss the likely scenario for an American invasion, how Britain could assist the United States and how Arab nations and the Soviet Union were likely to respond.

Arab members of OPEC imposed the embargo on the United States and other Western countries in October to try to force them to compel Israel to withdraw from Arab territories. The embargo, which lasted until March 1974, cut off only 13 percent of U.S. oil imports but caused steep gasoline price increases in the United States, Europe and Japan.

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