Or as Matt Drudge puts it, linking to this CBS report, “Soothe Criminal:”
Conrad Murray, 58, has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the death of Michael Jackson.
A jury of seven men and five women deliberated for less than two days before convicting Murray in Jackson’s 2009 death.
Jurors had 300 pieces of evidence to consider after listening to 49 witnesses and complex medical testimony during the six-week trial.
Prosecutors argued that Murray acted in a criminally negligent manner after giving Jackson a powerful dose of the anesthetic propofol as a sleep aid.
The defense, however, maintained that Jackson took a deadly dose of propofol when Murray left his bedroom hours before the singer’s death.
Murray, faces up to four years in prison when he’s sentenced on Nov. 29, but Judge Michael Pastor ordered him to be remanded immediately.
Pastor, who said Murray “poses a demonstrable risk to the safety of the public,” ordered him to be held without bond.
Murray will also lose his medical license as the result of his conviction.
Jackson’s death in 2009 was a wall-to-wall media frenzy; our post at the time hit 142 comments in no time flat. As I mentioned shortly afterwards, compare and contrast how the deaths of famous pop musicians were recorded by “the first draft of history” in different eras, and what that coverage says about our culture, both then and now. Compare the intense, Princess Diana-like media frenzy over Jackson’s death, with this surprisingly cold and dispassionate report from ABC News immediately upon Jimi Hendrix’s demise in 1970. As ABC newsman Gregory Jackson drolly began his report, “If you’re much over 30, the odds are you’ve never heard of Jimi Hendrix. Or only dimly, perhaps a loud voice on the car radio.” In contrast, Jackson heralded an era in which everyone seemed to wish to remain in perpetual adolescence until their demise. The Onion’s surprisingly brutal parody headline from 2009, “King Of Pop Dead At 12″ was, in retrospect, spot-on.
The events swirling around the death of MJ have all the satirical decadence of a Brunner SF novel from the 70s. When brutal satire becomes front page headlines you know we’re all in trouble and I date the start of it to a crazy old hag who held hot coffee between her legs and refused to tell her brain she thought of the idea.
You just lost my respect for your postings, as you do not have the facts regarding the lawsuit regarding Stella Liebeck. Old hag? Let’s hope this never happens to you or your mother or grandmother.
“There is a lot of hype about the McDonalds’ scalding coffee case. No one is in favor of frivolous cases of outlandish results; however, it is important to understand some points that were not reported in most of the stories about the case. McDonalds coffee was not only hot, it was scalding — capable of almost instantaneous destruction of skin, flesh and muscle. Here’s the whole story.
Stella Liebeck of Albuquerque, New Mexico, was in the passenger seat of her grandson’s car when she was severely burned by McDonalds’ coffee in February 1992. Liebeck, 79 at the time, ordered coffee that was served in a styrofoam cup at the drivethrough window of a local McDonalds.
Read the rest of here: http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm
Praise Allah. Maybe now I’ll be able to hear a news break without “All OJ, all the time” flashbacks.
I’m glad this story is over at last, but it ends on an ugly note indeed. There’s no doubt that Murray should have lost his medical license posthaste, but beyond that, I detect a strong whiff of scapegoating…
Now Dianne Sawyer can ooze over something else.
Cancel your cable, and Diana will stop bothering you. It’s heaven not to be assaulted by the talking heads on tv!
Dr. Conrad Murray was my husband’s cardiologist in 2002 when he had a heart attack while visiting in Las Vegas. He was absolutely marvelous in seeing us through ultimate by-pass surgery, done by Dr. Kohler at the University Hospital, following up to get us back to our home state quickly. He visited my husband frequently, even bringing his daughter on a Sunday afternoon. He arranged for a private room when we had been told none were available. He made it a point to keep my adult children informed of every step taken in the entire process, reassuring and comforting when necessary. There is no way this kind man could have taken a life, inadvertently or any other way. This patient was a whacked-out weirdo drug addicted child abuser whose family took advantage of Dr. Murray’s presence to keep the money pit open and producing. How could they allow this corrupted human being who provided them with so many goodies be exposed for what he really was?
Pepperpot’s comments are duly noted. My cardiologist seemed to be a real technician but his communication and follow-up skills sucked. It’s as if one didn’t matter. No wonder the suicide watch, I’ll wish him the best.
What do you think about a follow up?