Jackson doctor was 'in desperate financial straits' - trial witness

REUTERS

Katherine Jackson, mother of late pop star Michael Jackson, and Randy Jackson (L) watch AEG lawyer Marvin Putman in this courtroom sketch during opening arguments at her civil suit against concert promoter AEG Live in Los Angeles April 29, 2013.

REUTERS

LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson's personal doctor was in financial and legal troubles at the time of the singer's death, a Los Angeles detective testified on Wednesday in the wrongful death lawsuit brought by Jackson's family against concert promoters AEG Live.

Conrad Murray was "in desperate financial straits," and under legal pressure with liens against his property in Nevada, Los

Angeles police detective Orlando Martinez told a jury in the civil trial.

Martinez, who investigated Jackson's 2009 death, said Murray had unpaid student loans, was behind on credit card bills and owed rent for his business.

Murray, who had asked for $5 million to care for the singer, was convicted in 2011 for Jackson's involuntary manslaughter of Jackson through an overdose of powerful anesthetic propofol weeks before a planned series of 50 concerts.

Jackson's immediate family accuses AEG Live, who were promoting the London concerts, of negligence in hiring Murray, failing to conduct proper background checks and going to extreme lengths to get the singer ready for the shows. Murray is not being sued.

AEG Live maintains that Jackson kept his dependency on propofol secret from outsiders, that a proposed contract with Murray was never fully executed and they could not have foreseen that Murray posed a danger to Jackson.

Martinez was the second witness called by attorneys for Jackson's family. A paramedic who tended to Jackson after the overdose, testified on Tuesday that Murray had appeared "frantic," "pale" and "sweating" but never mentioned that Jackson had taken propofol, which is typically used in surgical settings.

Jackson, 50, was pronounced dead in a Los Angeles hospital on June 25, 2009, a day after a rehearsal and three weeks before the first concert on his "This Is It" tour.

Jackson's 82-year-old mother Katherine and the singer's two oldest children Prince and Paris, are also on the witness list later in the civil trial along with singers Diana Ross and Prince, and "The Incredible Hulk" actor Lou Ferrigno.

Attorneys for AEG Live warned jurors on Monday that the trial, expected to last three months, would expose "some ugly stuff" about the King of Pop.