SANTA MARIA, Calif. — The focus of Michael Jackson's child molestation trial shifted Tuesday from the entertainer's character to that of his alleged accuser's parents.

A Los Angeles comedian and benefactor of the family testified that the teenage boy's father was a hot-tempered freeloader who seemed to coach his children to scam celebrities, while his mother was a kind if overemotional woman beaten down by years of her husband's abuse and later terrified by Jackson and his associates.

The portrait Louise Palanker painted is problematic for Jackson because his lawyers have demonized the 15-year-old cancer survivor's mother as a powerful puppet-master behind false allegations designed to extort money.

Bad behavior by the accuser's father has less bearing because the couple had separated by the time of the alleged abuse and the boy and his siblings had no contact with him.

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For more than two hours on the stand, Palanker described a woman incapable of such grand manipulation.

"I feel that she's a lovely, caring person," said the comedian, who first befriended the boy, his older sister and young brother at a summer comedy camp run by the Laugh Factory comedy club for underprivileged children.

Palanker said she never knew the accuser to lie and that, in fact, "he's been honest in the face of others wishing not to be."

Palanker recounted the mother calling her in 2003, when the abuse allegedly occurred at Jackson's Neverland Ranch, and hysterically begged for help in dealing with the music legend and his employees, saying, "These people are evil."

"I felt like they were being held against their will," Palanker told jurors, adding that she asked her lawyer to consult with the woman.

In addition to molestation, Jackson, 46, is accused of conspiring to kidnap and imprison the family. He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Emergency medical technicians removed a fan from the courtroom after she fainted.

Palanker also contradicted several claims defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. made about her in his opening statement. He told jurors that Palanker would testify the mother approached her for money to pay medical bills and that, when she later found out they'd spent a portion of the $20,000 on a flat-screen television and DVD player, she felt robbed.

"She was upset," Mesereau said during openings.

But on the witness stand Tuesday, Palanker said it was her idea to give the money and that she gave it knowing insurance was covering the medical expenses.

She said she anticipated the family would use it to cover living expenses while the father took time off to be at the hospital with his son. However, she said she put no restrictions on the gift and was not angry when she found out about the entertainment system.

She also said the mother never asked her for money, while the father "continually" badgered her, even after the $20,000 gift.

"He kept telling me they didn't have any money to live on, no food, clothing," Palanker said, adding that when she asked what had happened to her gift, the father said his wife "spent the money on votive candles and things of that nature."

Scams of the father

She also related an incident in which comedian and television actor George Lopez, an acquaintance from the Laugh Factory, believed the father was coaching his children to lie.

Lopez met the boy at the comedy camp and, after he became ill, invited him to his home. Later, Palanker said, the father called Lopez and said the boy left a wallet with $300 at the home. When Lopez found it, the wallet only contained $3 and the actor "became irate," believing himself the target of a scam, Palanker said.

She said that, when the father tried to get his son to tell her there was $300 in the wallet, the boy was uncomfortable and refused to say anything.

The father "got enraged" with the accuser, and "we never solved the mystery of the wallet," she testified.

She also told jurors she believed the father had instructed his children not to reveal Christmas gifts they received from other benefactors. Only when the father left the room did the accuser tell her that Michael Jackson had given him a PlayStation2.

Under cross-examination by Mesereau, Palanker acknowledged that she thought there was something strange about the family, including the mother, who she felt might be bipolar.

"I couldn't really put my finger on what was out of balance with this family, certainly not the children, never the children," she said.

She also conceded that "Tonight Show" host Jay Leno called her and complained that the accuser and his family had left him three voice mails and he wanted them to stop. She told the father to stop calling him, she said.

Both Lopez and Leno might be called as witnesses.

Improving health

Jackson stared toward the witness stand as Palanker testified. The pop icon appeared in better health than Monday, when he arrived late to court and in the company of a physician.

Dressed in a black suit with a red and white ribbon as an armband, he walked more quickly from his SUV to the courthouse than Monday but leaned on a security guard for assistance.

A fan who spoke with a court officer later fainted, then screamed when she was taken away.

A defense lawyer, Brian Oxman, said Jackson was still in pain, but "he's holding up and bearing through it."

During a break in testimony, a fan who had been sitting in the public gallery fainted. When court officers approached to offer assistance, she began screaming, "Michael! Michael!" and kicking at the officers. Court was briefly delayed while the woman was removed on a stretcher, but her screams were heard in the courtroom for several minutes.

Judge Rodney Melville recessed court for the day at 11:30 a.m. so he could attend the dedication of a new juvenile justice facility.

The trial will resume Wednesday morning.