Jury to decide on MJ case

The jury of six men and six women will decide if concert promoter AEG Live is responsible for the hiring of Dr Conrad Murray, the cardiologist serving four years for giving Michael Jackson propofol.After five months of testimony that exposed many secrets of Michael Jackson’s personal life, jurors started deliberations last Thursday to decide whether concert promoter AEG Live should be held liable for the King of Pop’s bizarre overdose death.

Ten deputies were sworn in to escort the jury of six men and six women around the Los Angeles courthouse during their partial sequestration with catered lunches.

A lawyer for Katherine Jackson had the last word in her billion-dollar wrongful death case last week and portrayed AEG as a callous corporation that refuses to accept any responsibility for the alleged negligent hiring of Dr Murray.

Murray, a Las Vegas cardiologist, is now serving four years behind bars after a different Los Angeles jury found him criminally responsible for giving Michael the surgery-strength anaesthetic propofol that killed him in June 2009.

“How dare (AEG) come up here and accept no responsibility,” Katherine’s lawyer Brian Panish fumed in his two-hour rebuttal after AEG’s final presentation.

“Michael paid the ultimate price. He’s not here,” Panish said.
AEG Live has denied any wrongdoing in the case, saying Michael hired Murray way back in 2006 and never mentioned his use of propofol as a sleep aid as he negotiated to pay Murray’s US$150 000-per-month tour salary with an advance from AEG.

In duelling closing arguments, both sides accused the other of flawed logic. Panish said AEG lawyers are contradicting themselves when they claim Michael “demanded” Murray on tour and “wouldn’t take no for an answer”, but then argue the doctor’s contract wasn’t binding because Michael never consented with his signature.

AEG lawyer Marvin Putnam claimed Katherine’s side wants it both ways in saying Michael became an “emaciated” and “deteriorating” mess as he cracked under the pressure of his 50 comeback concerts, but still would have gone on to earn more than US$1 billion from multiple world tours had he lived. — New York Daily News.