SANTA MARIA, California (AFP) – Neverland Ranch was a “pleasure island” where children ran amok, appeared to be drunk and slept in Michael Jackson’s private quarters, the star’s former housekeeper said yesterday.

In explosive testimony, Kiki Fournier told the superstar’s child molestation trial that young guests frequently stayed over at Neverland and would run wild on the fantasy-themed estate.

“Neverland became like Pinocchio’s pleasure island without the parents,” said Fournier, who from 1991 to 2003 worked at the sprawling estate where Jackson is accused of abusing his teen accuser after plying him with alcohol.

On a couple of occasions, “children appeared to be intoxicated” at the ranch, the former housekeeper told jurors.

Once, when a small group of children were having dinner with the 46 year-old Jackson with no other adults present, “two or three” of the children appeared to be intoxicated, she said.

She told the court that children would spend weeks on end at the ranch during their school holidays and would run wild on the property, eating what and when they wanted, watching videos, staying up all night and having food fights.

On many occasions, she said, children would refuse to sleep in the bedrooms they had been assigned.

“Usually they’d get assigned some place to sleep, but sometimes they would stay with Mr Jackson,” she told jurors.

Jackson would sometimes pick some children over others to spend time with, Fournier added.

Jackson is charged on 10 counts of sexually molesting the boy, plying him with alcohol in order to seduce him and conspiring to kidnap him and his family and hold them against their will at Neverland two years ago.

Asked whether she noticed any change in the behaviour of children who stayed at the ranch, she said: “Yes, their behaviour did change.

“The more free rein they had to play, the more wild and destructive they became,” she told the panel that could send Jackson to jail for up to 20 years, if convicted.

In the case of Jackson’s now 15 year-old accuser, she said he was initially polite and kept his room tidy, but eventually “it was just a mess”.

Jackson has pleaded innocent to the charges against him and his lawyers claim his young accuser and his family made up the allegations of sex abuse in order to extort money from him.

They say the boy only accused Jackson after meeting with a lawyer who brokered an out-of-court settlement worth more than 20 million dollars for a boy who accused the superstar of molestation in 1993.

In a crucial move, prosecutor Tom Sneddon has asked Judge Rodney Melville to consider next week whether the jury should be told about the 1993 case.

Jackson’s lawyers have until Friday to raise any objections to the move.