Dr. Conrad Murray Found Guilty

I have a first edition of Devils, Drugs and Doctors, which I have read, written by Howard W. Haggard M.D. Associate Professor of Applied Physiology, Yale University. It cost a wodge of dough too.

I took a skim at it in relation to this case.



Who knows what MJ was experimenting with in order to bring forth after much labour his artistic visions, or possibly his medical experiments. With hindsight we know that in this case something untoward did occur of which Dr Murray is the most obvious financial victim. The outcome is the only difference between the Queen of England and the King of Pop.

Malinowski refers somewhere to the amount of grief expressed at a death being directly proportional to how much is gained from the death. It is not considered decorous to dance on one father's coffin when one has inherited his extensive estates and privileges. And aside from financial gain there is the wonderful possibility of being able to express one's virtue and parade one's compassion in a theatrical display of verbal flouncing.

From a scientific point of view, leaving aside all the play-acting and posturing, Dr Murray seems to have suffered the greatest loss. Everybody else is quids-in.



That's from a translation of the poem of Salerno by Sir John Harington who invented the water closet without which I fear cities would be impossible.

MJ needed to make "good verses". You lot don't. Nor anyone else prancing on this stage.

* A leading proponent of the use of analgesia in childbirth.

I don't know why I get all this stick and fm raising his hind leg to relieve himself when Arella asked in the starter post "What do you think?"

Am I supposed to say what I don't think so that no-one will be discomfited? I don't use TV and newspapers to tell me what to think.

This case is about one thing and one thing only: Dr. Murray Conrad broke the law, someone died, and Dr. Conrad was found guilty and faces a sentence.

The circumstances, i.e, previous drug use, recreational drug use, money, fame, etc. have nothing to do with it according to the law.

It's not that I don't care what you think. It's that you totally are disregarding the law and the black and white of the fact the man commited a crime. MJ commited a crime by using drugs the way he did and the way he obtained them but that does not negate the fact Dr. Murray Conrad is the one that was on trial and is held accountable for his actions.

MJ was held accountable too, not by the court, but by his death.

I wish you would stop such rational postings forcing me to agree a 100 percents with you.

I still think this is because spendius has a thing for the doctor

I don't doubt that.

Most of the time, such incompetence is addressed through malpractice actions or civil suits, with the penalties being financial and/or disciplinary in terms of licensure.

However, in the past ten years, there has been an increasing tendency to also bring criminal charges in those instances where the physician's egregious, reckless, or extremely negligent actions constitute violations of criminal laws.

So, charging and convicting Conrad Murray of a crime, related to his negligent practice of medicine, is hardly a unique occurrence. This case was simply considerably more highly publicized than most because of the victim involved.

MJ had not been "using" Propofol--that is an inaccurate description. The patient does not use Propofol, the patient receives it. The physician, as the one who administers the drug, is the one who "uses" the drug to induce deep sedation or a hypnotic state, generally so the person can undergo a surgical procedure, which is the primary proscribed use of that drug. The responsibility is, therefore, on the physician to assure the safe administration of this drug.

Your main problem is that you didn't watch this trial, or closely follow the testimony and evidence presented at trial, so you are ignorant of the information the jury considered in applying the law and reaching their verdict. The relevant information about Propofol was discussed in great length by medical experts for both the defense and prosecution, and there was unanimous agreement among them that Dr. Murray's use of this drug was inappropriate for the treatment of insomnia, and that he recklessly administered the drug in an inappropriate setting with inadequate safeguards for his patient's welfare and life.

No, it was about medical malpractice which was so egregious it resulted in a homicide. Had you watched the trial, or even followed it closely, you would have been aware of that.

Propofol was not the only drug that Dr. Murray was supplying to his patient. Jackson was also on huge quantities of benzodiazepines, which potentiate the action of Propofol and thereby increase the probability that life-threatening events, like interruption or cessation of respiration, will occur. That would have made it all the more important for Jackson to have been adequately monitored when receiving Propofol, and for Dr. Murray to have had resuscitation equipment and other medical personnel available for assistance in case of a medical emergency, and for him to have never left Jackson unattended or unobserved as he did.

There is no indication that MJ had regularly been receiving Propofol before Dr, Murray appeared on the scene in May 2009, and, by his own admission, began giving MJ nightly IV infusions of that drug.
And Dr. Murray obtained no signed consent forms that indicated he had discussed possible adverse effects of Propofol administration with MJ and that he had MJ's informed consent for such administration.

Most of your various questions about Propofol are unrelated to this case. If you want the answers so badly, you can find the info on the internet.

This case was about the extremely irresponsible, reckless, and ultimately criminal, actions of a physician which caused the needless and untimely death of his patient. Dr. Murray acted in such a negligent manner that he showed reckless disregard for the life of his patient. Who that patient was is irrelevant in evaluating the physician's actions.

The verdict in this case sends a message to the medical community that they are not above the law simply by virtue of holding a medical license. That license carries with it obligations and responsibiities to maintain certain standards of patient care in order to minimize and prevent harm to patients, and, when departures from such standards of care are so egregious that they result in the death of a patient, criminal charges may also be applied. And, in terms of protecting the consumers of medical services, that's a message that most in the public would likely support.

I know all that ff.

You just like the sound of your own voice when it goes on a rigmarole of the utmost banality. I'm surprised you don't go into politics. Fancy flapdoodle banality is very popular. The voice of the people none of whom want any exercise for their intelligence.

I'm not convinced that "patient" is a suitable word to categorise Jacko. And I'm not convinced that "reckless", "extremely negligent" and "criminal" actions resulting in death should only draw a few months of jail time.

Thanks for ignoring the recreational use of the drug and its potential for inspiring creative art or priapic conditions. It must have been difficult for you to resist mentioning those things because they are what my remarks are based upon. It's obvious from your reckless and negligent ignoring of them that this thread is dead and was so at the moment the jury pronounced its verdict.

How can he hear his voice? This is typing - visual - not hearing.

No, Arella Mae, I really don't agree with you about that. I don't think MJ committed any crimes with his drug use.

Jackson was addicted to various prescription drugs, mainly benzodiazepines, and he had built up an enormous tolerance for these drugs, causing him to ingest them in very high quantities in order to get any desired effect, and also to reduce effects of withdrawal.
But he apparently obtained all of these drugs in a legal manner, by prescription from duly licensed physicians--he didn't break the law to obtain the drugs. The physicians who supplied him with these drugs, often knowingly writing the prescriptions for an alias or in the name of a person other than Jackson, might have been the ones violating the law, particularly if they were supplying them to a known addict, rather than treating an illness or medical condition. Writing prescriptions for patient aliases can be seen as a way a physician might attempt to skirt the laws on controlled substances so they can prescribe more than the law allows to a particular patient. And, in that regard, the DEA did investigate why Jackson had such huge quantities of controlled drugs prescribed by various doctors in different patient names. They don't seem to have come up with anything substantial enough to warrant criminal charges.

Prescription drug abuse is a huge problem in this country. But it's also physicians who prescribe these drugs and get patients hooked in the first place, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Then they have a patient who is dependent on continuing to see them, in order to continue receiving the prescriptions and drugs, and this helps to maintain the doctor's income.

Whether it was the benzodiazepines that Jackson obtained from various doctors, including Conrad Murray, or the Demerol injections he got from his dermatologist, Arnold Klein, Jackson found doctors who were willing to get him hooked and/or keep him hooked. But the responsibility for not going along with this drug-pushing rests with the physician, not his drug-addicted and drug-addled patient.
Jackson needed rehab, not more addictive drugs.

I found many things about Michael Jackson extremely distasteful and unsavory, but I don't think his prescription drug abuse was something we should unfairly blame him for or even condemn him for. He was surrounded by enablers, many of whom were physicians who directly supplied him with these drugs, and those are the people I would blame. Jackson needed medical help, but not of the sort he was getting from those people.

If he wasn't the Dr.'s patient - then the doctor shouldn't have been treating him - all the more reason for him to be considered reckless.

Just speaking as an American citizen,
I wanna offer the opinion, that I consider it very unlikely
that the State had any authority to enact that "law";
i.e., when the government of California was created
by the citizens, (in my opinion) it is very unlikely
that those citizens, in effect, said to their baby
(the newly created government, in its constitution)
anything like:
" if we are too stupid in our personal choices,
then we want u, the State, to watch us and to break in on us
and make us do what YOU want us to do
because, being a government, you are smarter
than we are and we respect your judgment better than our own,
because we (your creators) are stupider than you, our creation."
I doubt that that happened. Accordingly, if such jurisdiction
was not granted to the State, then its jurisdiction to control
what the citizens ingest was STOLEN (usurped) and fraudulent jurisdiction.
If that is so, then it shoud be deemed void.
That 's how it seems to me.
Admittedly: I don 't know the law of California,
nor do I know California 's constitutional history.





David

That was his relationship--his legal relationship--with Conrad Murray. And Murray had signed a contract with AEG that formalized that doctor/patient relationship.
Whether or not you are convinced that "patient" is a suitable word is irrelevant--it is the legally appropriate word and we are discussing a legal matter.

Your various mental meanderings may be interesting to you, but they bear no relevance to this legal case or to the evidence or testimony presented at trial. You seem to find strictly legal issues too banal to really consider, or bother with, which is why you digress into all sorts of unrelated matters and flights of fancy, which also makes it puzzling why you continue to post in threads discussing legal matters.

People can certainly disagree with the verdict in this case, but, to knowledgeably do that, they'd still have to be familiar with the evidence and testimony the jury had to consider--because that's what led to the verdict. So far, I'm still waiting for you to come up with something compelling that raises reasonable doubt about Dr. Murray's guilt, in terms of what was presented at trial.

Well--they wouldn't want to go too far down that road would they?

The rest of your post is a serious indictment of the medical profession. Nothing new in it of course. It's why I think Dr Murray was victimised for money. What he was doing is pretty routine in every posh medical practice. It's how to get posh.

Show me evidence that the agreement with AEG used the word "patient" to categorise MG. I think "personal physician" and "client" are more appropriate. I presume Mr Obama has a personal physician. I doubt he or she describes the president as a "patient".

Listen you silly moocow--my whole point is what was not presented at trial. Have you not figured that out yet? It was a show trial. In terms of what was presented at trial Dr Murray is as guilty as DSK is not guilty.

"personal physician" and "client" are used interchangeably with patient in the medical community.

They do not use client in a different manner because of the relationship, but because they do not want it to appear as there is a dependent relationship. Basically because it sounds better - not because of a different relationship.

"patient [pa´shent]
a person who is ill or is undergoing treatment for disease. There is considerable debate regarding the appropriate use of this term. In some institutional settings it is not used because it is thought to denote a dependent relationship on the part of the person undergoing treatment. The words client, resident, and at times guest can also be used to refer to a person receiving treatment."

And if helpful here is the formula definition:
patient (pt.)
[pā′shənt]
Etymology: L, pati, to suffer
1 a recipient of a health care service.
2 a health care recipient who is ill or hospitalized.
3 a client in a health care service.

Then why didn't his lawyers present something different in trial. Funny thing is the defendants own expert doctor witness confirmed that the drug was used inappropriately in trial.

Not the nightly administration of IV Propofol, for insomnia, in a patient's bedroom. That is pretty much unheard of.

How was Murray "victimized" for anything? He willingly agreed to be doing whatever he did for, and to, Michael Jackson.
He gave up his medical practices in May 2009 so he could exclusively treat Jackson, and that sort of arrangement is very atypical. How many doctors treat only one patient--particularly a patient who isn't suffering from a serious medical condition that requires a physician to be exclusively available 24/7? And why would a physician want to do something like that?

Murray may have been a victim of his own greed, because he liked to live considerably above his means, and that may have caused him to violate the ethics of his profession, and, in the process completey disregard the welfare of his patient, but that's his own character flaw, and not related to anyone else victimizing him.

And no, such things are not routine in any "posh practice". Nor was Murray's normal patient clientale, in any of his three offices--in Nevada, Texas, and California--what one would describe as "posh"--he seems to have had a rather average cardiology practice before getting involved with Jackson. He wasn't even board certified in either internal medicine or cardiology--and "posh" clients generally seek out and want the most highly qualified doctors, because they are the ones who can afford them.
I have physician friends who do have "posh practices"--their patients include the very wealthy, the very well known, and the very influential. And all of them practice top-notch medicine and have excellent professional reputations, which is why such patients flock to them and remain in their care. Conrad Murray was nowhere in their league, not by a long-shot.

It was only "inappropriate" in terms of the received opinions current in the courtroom. Thus the term is tautological.

I reckon I could have got him off if a unanimous verdict was mandatory. That I might have tested the patience of the judge, the jury, the officials and the public in attempting it is neither here nor there.