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In picture: Prosecutor David Walgren holds a bottle of the anesthetic propofol as he questions Alberto Alvarez, one of Michael Jackson’s bodyguards, during the trial.
LOS ANGELES (Xinhua) — A security guard Thursday provided the most detailed public account yet of Michael Jackson’s death, testifying that Jackson’s personal physician Conrad Murray tried to hide evidence before calling 911.
On the third day of Murray’s trial, Alberto Alvarez, the singer’s former security chief, testified that when he entered Jackson’s bedroom, he was instructed by the doctor to collect a number of vials as well as a saline bag and stash them in bags.
“While I was at the foot of the bed, he reached over and grabbed a handful of vials and said, ‘Here, put these in a bag,’” the bodyguard, who was also the superstar’s director of logistics, told the jury at the Los Angeles Superior Court.
Alvarez saw Jackson lying on his back while Murray was performing chest compressions for Jackson. When Murray asked if anyone knew how to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), Alvarez took over chest compressions so that the doctor could begin mouth-to-mouth breathing.0 “After a few breaths, he (Murray) said, ‘This is the first time I do mouth-to-mouth, but I have to, this is my friend,’” Alvarez testified.
In a frenzied state, Murray told Alvarez that they needed to get an ambulance. But then Jackson’s two oldest children, Paris and Prince, entered Jackson’s bedroom at his rented Holmby Hills home.
Alvarez ushered the children out at Murray’s request, then returned to ask what had happened.
“When I came into the room he said, ‘Alberto, hurry, we have to take him to the hospital, we have to get him an ambulance,’” Alvarez said.
Kneeling near a nightstand next to the bed, Murray began to collect vials. He told Alvarez to put them in a bag and then put the bag inside another brown bag.
Alvarez recalled there was a bottle with a “milky-white substance” at the bottom of one bag, which appeared to be the Propofol later found by authorities.
Believing that Murray had the best intensions for Jackson and that they were just packing to get ready to take an ambulance, Alvarez did what he was told. After collecting those items, Alvarez called 911, also at Murray’s request.
Alvarez and Murray moved Jackson onto the bedroom floor, as instructed by the 911 dispatcher. Alvarez then saw Murray take what appeared to be a heart monitor from the bed and clip it on Jackson’s finger.
On cross-examination, Alvarez admitted that he didn’t tell authorities about him and Murray collecting the vials in Jackson’s bedroom until two months after the singer’s death, when he saw a CNN report with footage of detectives carrying bags from the house and discussing Propofol.
Later on Thursday, Jackson’s personal chef Kai Chase testified that she was in the kitchen the day Jackson died. Murray, “in a panic,” came down the stairs toward the kitchen between 12:05 p.m. and 12:10 p.m.
Murray asked Chase to “get help, get security, get Prince,” she recalled, adding the doctor was “very nervous and frantic, and he was shouting.”
Jackson was pronounced dead at 2:26 p.m. at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. The coroner’s office determined that Jackson died of acute Propofol intoxication and classified his death as a homicide.
Prosecutors accused Murray of having given Jackson Propofol, a powerful sedative, and then failing to monitor him, leaving the bedroom for 45 minutes to send emails and make phone calls.
They contended that the cardiologist “repeatedly acted with gross negligence, repeatedly denied care, appropriate care to his patient,Michael Jackson, and that it was Dr. Murray’s repeated incompetence and unskilled acts that led to Mr. Jackson’s death on June 25, 2009.”
Defense attorneys argued Murray was weaning Jackson off the medication, but that the singer “self-administered” a lethal dose.
The trial is expected to last four to five weeks. Murray, who is set free on a bail of 75,000 U.S. dollars, faces up to four years in prison if convicted of involuntary manslaughter.
Courtesy:
http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=732528&publicationSubCategoryId=200
