Sally Hirschberg
The first testimony of the day came from Sally Hirschberg, a medical supply representative who worked closely with Conrad Murray's office. Hirschberg stated the amount of orders she was receiving from Murray was out of the ordinary for what a cardiologist needs. It was also unusual for a cardiologist to buy Lidocaine and IV bags.
A huge list of drugs and equipment that was ordered by Murray for Jackson was shown to the jurors.
Hirschberg testified that she was asked by Murray to ship to a home address but Hirschberg refused as it was against policy to ship to homes.
On 26th June 2009 Hirschberg received a call to cancel all further medical supply orders.
Stephen Marx
The second person to testify was Stephen Marx, a computer forensic examiner. Marx had examined Murray's iPhone.
Most of Marx testimony centred on emails sent between AEG representatives (such as Paul Gongaware), Conrad Murray and Bob Taylor in the UK about Michael's health and specifications the insurers needed.
The insurers required lots of details about Michael’s present and previous medical health. Some of the questions in the emails asked if Michael had any medical issues such as back problems, lung problems, cancer, cosmetic procedures, anorexia. The insurers were keen to know if any speculative reports in the media about Jackson's ill health were fact or rumour. AEG were eager to get Michael to take any evaluations that the insurers needed and also thought it would be positive as they could then dismiss all the negative reports in the media about Michael's health.
The insurers were insistent that they would not insure Jackson for illness cover unless Michael carried out tests in a two hour assessment with them and they had thorough medial reports and a review of a rehearsal.
When Murray replied to these emails he stated that all reports about MJ's ill health were false to his knowledge. Murray also stated that MJ refused authorisation to release his medical records. Murray said he was the only doctor who was treating Michael since 2006.
It seems the defence will try to prove Jackson was already sick. Refusal to release medical records and no response to questions about media speculations could suggest there were medical conditions that were trying to be hidden. Also high profile conditions and illnesses or injuries that Michael suffered from that had been confirmed in courts of law or by Jackson's management had not been stated to insurers.
Audio recordings
The court was then played an audio recording from Murray's iPhone of Frank DiLeo, Michael Jackson's manager. In the voicemail from June 20th 2009 DiLeo states that MJ had an 'episode' last night and was sick. DiLeo said they need to do a blood test on Jackson to 'see what he is doing'. This infers that DiLeo was also aware MJ had a drug problem. I had previously mentioned that I feel a lot more people than Murray were aware of MJ's decline but no one did anything. This audio recording does imply that Michael's manager knew of the problem but was not doing much to stop it.
It is also interesting that DiLeo phoned Murray to discuss conducting a blood test to 'see what he [Michael Jackson] is doing' as this implies he may have thought MJ was taking some form of drugs without people's knowledge. In the case so far it seems to have shown that Michael was only using drugs that Murray administered or prescribed.
Marx then talked about an audio recording from the iTalk app, a digital voice recorder application on the iPhone. The recording was from May 10th 2009 and was an extended version of the slurred recording of Jackson that was played in the opening statements.
In the recording MJ talks about wanting to build a children’s hospital. Michael states children are sick because they are depressed. He spoke of how a hospital would be remembered more than his performance. Michael said 'I love them. I love them because I didn't have a childhood. I feel their pain. I feel their hurt'....'Heal the World', 'We Are The World, Will You Be There, The Lost Children these are songs I have written because I hurt. You know, I hurt'.
Murray then asked 'You OK?' Jackson replied 'I am asleep.'
This was a very sad recording to hear. It almost feels like Michael was asking for help and no one acknowledged it. It is sad that Michael would confide in Murray and even though it was obvious he was unhappy Murray never alerted anyone or tried to help resolve any issues. Instead he kept medicating Michael. As previously mentioned the people surrounding Michael knew that something was wrong (from testimonies from Kenny Ortega and a voicemail message from Frank DiLeo) but it seems it was almost easier for everyone to keep MJ sedated as it made him malleable to their needs.
Throughout the years I think Michael made it perfectly clear that he has problems that he was struggling with, (for example the very themes of the songs ‘Morphine’ and ‘Childhood’). Even when he clearly spelt out how he was feeling it got ignored. This would seemingly exacerbate the problems and can maybe point toward why Michael was having trouble sleeping and needing insomnia treatments. It could also be speculated that this could have also been one of the contributing factors to his drug use (although there are other suggested causes, for example the need for long term use of pain medication due to injuries such as his back injury which occurred after a stage prop malfunction during Earth Song in Germany in 1999)
In such a lucid state people often are brutally honest. It is amazing to think that even in such a state Michael's concern was the plight of sick children.
Elissa Fleak
The final testimony of the day was from Elissa Fleak, a coroner investigator for the LA county coroner's office. A coroner investigator performs death investigations to decide whether a death was a homicide, suicide, accident or natural.
Fleak stated on 25th June 2009 she went UCLA to examine Michael Jackson. The court was then shown a photo of Jackson on a gurney taken by Fleak. Fleak states she saw no obvious signs of trauma. Fleak then collected four vials of blood that were taken at the time of treatment at UCLA.
On 25th and 29th of June 2009 Fleak went to Jackson's house to perform a scene investigation of where Michael died. The court was then shown photos of Michael's house and the bedroom in which he died. Fleak collected evidence that eventually was given to LAPD.
The prosecution presented evidence to Fleak to look at and confirm if these items were collected by her during the investigation. Fleak had to go through each item individually, leading to this section taking hours to complete as there were so many pieces of evidence.
Evidence
First the prosecution presented the evidence by the areas that they were discovered. First to be presented was a 20ml bottle of Propofol found next to the bed. Fleak states the bottle was empty. Also collected was an empty bottle of Flumazenil (a drug taken as an antidote to a benzodiazepine overdose for drugs such as Propofol). Also collected were 3 prescription drug bottles from the side table next to the bed. The drugs were Diazepam (prescribed by Conrad Murray, June 20th 2009), Lorazepam (prescribed by Conrad Murray, April 28th 2009), and Flomax (prescribed by Conrad Murray, June 3rd 2009).
On the lower shelf of the bedside table there was a wicker basket with additional prescription meds. These were; Clonazepam, Temazepam, Tizanidine and Trazodone. Some of these prescriptions were prescribed by a Dr Alan Metzger. Also some prescriptions used other people’s names (thought to be aliases of Jackson’s). Earlier in the proceedings an email sent by Murray in regard to insurance showed that Murray stated he was the only doctor treating Michael since 2006. This evidence would show that this was false as Dr Alan Metzger had prescribed drugs to Jackson.
On the left of the wicker basket was some Anthelios lotion, a high end sunscreen.
Also found in the bedroom were tubes of lotions. These were; Hydroquinone cream, Benoquin 20% and Lidocaine 4%. All three creams were prescribed by Conrad Murray. These are all skin bleaching creams. Previously Tim Lopez, a pharmacist, stated that Murray had spoken to him about needing skin whitening creams for African-American patients that suffered from Vitiligo.
There were also several oxygen tanks in the bedroom and one on a rolling dolly near the bed. Also on the floor was an ambubag. Under the ambubag was an IV catheter. Other medical supplies and needles were found nearby.
On a glass table near the bed was a 10CC syringe (with no needle), Lidocaine, alcohol prep pads, IV catheters, latex gloves and a box of syringes.
Also found in the bedroom was a syringe with a needles attached which was attached to a saline bag via tubes and hung on an IV stand.
In the closet
Fleak also searched the adjoining walk in closet. Inside the closet were various bags, including the bags Alverez mentioned in his testimony.
In a blue Costco bag was a pulse oximeter and a cut open saline bag with a 100ml bottle of Propofol inside it. Fleak states there was some liquid at bottom of saline bag. The Propofol bottle was more or less empty. Also found inside the same bag was an empty 20ml bottle of Propofol, a 10ml vial of Lorazepam, 2 bottles of Midazolam, a small bloody prep pad/gauze, and a plastic bag with medical debris. The blue bag was mentioned by Alverez in his testimony. Alverez stated that when he arrived into the bedroom Michael was lying on the bed. Murray then asked him to put some items, (specifically a Propofol bottle and a saline bag), into a blue bag. After Alverez did this he then called 911.
In a baby essentials bag there were 2 100ml Propofol bottles (full), 7 smaller 20ml Propofol bottles (4 unopened, 3 were opened but contained different levels of liquid), 3 Lidocaine bottles (1 unopened, 2 opened and partially consumed), 3 10ml vials of Midazolam (2 unopened, 1 opened), 4 bottles of Flumazenil (3 unopened, 1 opened and majority consumed), 2 bottles of Lorazepam (1 unopened, 1 opened and half full), a pill bottle containing Ephedrine, caffeine and aspirin, a lotion, eye drops, an IV tubing device, a blue tourniquet and 5 business cards for Conrad Murray.
Next to the bags were some lotions. There were 18 tubes of Hydroquinone and 18 tubes of Benoquin. In an earlier testimony during the trial it was stated that after Michael Jackson was pronounced dead at UCLA Murray was insistent he be taken back to Jackson's house to remove creams that Jackson wouldn't want the world to know about. I presume that these were the creams and Michael wanted them to be kept private as they were skin bleaching treatments.
Summary
By the end of the day nearly the whole of the prosecutor's table was taken up with vials of medicines, creams, bags and medical equipment. It is extraordinary just how many items Murray was using. It seems the treatments were almost out of control. To have nine medicines next to a bed that can be used as sedatives is incredible. How bad does someone's insomnia need to be that nine different medications need to be tried or used? I think it shows Murray was ridiculously overmedicating Jackson. Anything on this scale in an unregulated and non-clinical environment is an accident waiting to happen.
I have been interested to hear the coroner's office testify in this case as this investigation (as well as autopsy / toxicology reports) will define how Michael Jackson actually died. Combined with the coroner's investigation of the house it should give a good indication of what occurred on 25th June 2009. As Conrad Murray and Michael Jackson are the only two people who actually know what happened that day this will be the closest we will ever come to knowing the events that took place. Fleak’s testimony is going to be one of the most crucial in the trial.
Tomorrow Fleak will continue her testimony.
Sophie Dewing (@sophiedewing)
http://exploredreamdiscoverblog.blogspot.com/
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