Michael Jackson's History Sold for a Song

A S B U R Y   P A R K, N.J., March 4 -- In a strange twist of fate, a New Jersey businessman hit the music world's jackpot — a warehouse stuffed with the King of Pop's personal belongings — and he got it for a song.

Henry Vaccaro said he never expected to get caught up in a legal battle with Michael Jackson's family. But he did, and in the end, he wound up with Jackson memorabilia that could be worth a small fortune.

Vaccaro says his story with the Jackson family began back in 1993, when, he says, the Jackson family failed to follow through on a deal to buy Vaccaro's guitar company.

Vaccaro said the family never paid him what they owed, and after years in the courtroom, the items of memorabilia became the focus of the legal drama.

Vaccaro says he managed to get the entire warehoused Jackson collection — thousands of items — after the Jackson family failed to pay a $60,000 bill for the storage of the items.

Vaccaro said he picked up the bill, and the case with the Jackson family was settled as he became the owner of the family's memorabilia.

The deal of a lifetime left a complete stranger owning the Jackson family's personal history.

‘Largest Private Collection’

"It's pretty big. It's the largest private collection in the world of Michael Jackson and Jackson family memorabilia," Vaccaro said on ABCNEWS' Good Morning America. "Well, you know, it's crazy … how they could let a complete stranger get all their personal possessions?"

Vaccaro's enormous collection had been displayed in a 6,000-square-foot section of a 50,000-square-foot warehouse. But the collection — which was only seen by outsiders on jacksonvault.com, a pay-per-view Web site — is on its way out of the United States, according to Vaccaro.

The collection has been sold to a mysterious overseas buyer, and will be shipped out of the country in just a matter of days

Why didn't Michael Jackson, the wealthiest and most famous member of the musical family, step in and stop this?