Day 22 of Court: The Prosecution and Defense’s Work Comes to an End

Yesterday, another court session was held in the trial concerning Michael Jackson’s murder.

On this day, the defendant, Conrad Murray, announced in response to the court judge that he would not come to the stand to give testimony. Judge Michael Pastor had left the decision on this matter to him. With this decision, Murray saved himself from a tough confrontation with the prosecutor.

One of the most newsworthy events from yesterday was the removal of one of Michael’s fans from the courtroom. Police escorted him out while he was shouting “Murderer! Murderer!” Other fans outside the courtroom lined up in a row, holding hands beside the hallway.

In the short session yesterday, the prosecutor and the defense attorneys called their final witnesses to the stand and announced the closing of the case. The court will be closed until Thursday, and on that day the defense attorneys and the prosecution will be present to deliver their closing arguments. It is expected that by the final days of this week, the case will be in the hands of the jury, and there is a possibility that in the coming week we will see the final verdict announced for Dr. Murray.

Yesterday, Dr. White returned to the stand to complete his testimony from the previous day. Prosecutor Walgren had, in the earlier session, forced him to admit Murray’s mistake.

White said he is not willing to do anything that Murray did regarding Michael Jackson. He added that he would not accept such a heavy responsibility.

The prosecutor says that Murray, motivated by greed for money and a proposed monthly salary of $150,000, injected Michael with propofol for two months so that he could sleep. In the end, this drug caused his death.

Propofol should only be used in a hospital, but as a result of this case, the world heard about its home use for the first time.

White says that Michael got up from anesthesia and injected himself with the propofol-filled syringe that Murray had left behind in his room. He said that accepting the assumption that Murray injected his patient with a large amount of propofol requires accepting that he intended to kill Michael Jackson.

White also said he doesn’t think that when Michael carried out this injection as claimed by him, he was aware of its consequences and dangers, nor that he was seeking his own death.

The prosecutor used his testimony by posing a question: would he leave the patient alone with a syringe full of propofol at his side?White: “No, I wouldn’t do that.”

After White, Shaffer took the stand. In previous sessions, he had said that propofol, due to gravity, when Murray was not in the room, had been pulled toward the IV connected to Michael’s leg and had entered his vein drop by drop to the very end. The prosecutor says Murray used the IV drip method to give Michael propofol, not an ampoule.

Yesterday, Shaffer once again emphasized that Michael Jackson could not have caused his own death. He also said that his death did not necessarily occur at noon and could have happened earlier.

“While the process of propofol entering his body continued, death could have occurred at any time. The biggest danger from injecting propofol is respiratory arrest.”

Shaffer said that when Michael suffered respiratory arrest, Murray’s doctor was not there to help him, and when he finally returned to the room, due to clumsiness he couldn’t do anything. As a result, Michael suffered cardiac arrest and died.

Source: eMJey.com / Reuters LA Times.com