Michael Jackson Doctor Conrad Murray's Trial Set For January

Murray is charged with involuntary manslaughter in Jackson's death.
By Gil Kaufman


Dr. Conrad Murray
Photo: Toby Canham/ Getty Images

More than a year after Michael Jackson's death, the pop icon's former personal physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, was in court Monday (August 23) where a judge finally set a preliminary date of January 4, 2011, in the cardiologist's involuntary-manslaughter trial.

TMZ reported that Murray's legal team won a request to get a fluid sample from Jackson as part of their defense strategy questioning the accuracy of levels of the surgical anesthetic propofol found in Jackson's body. The Los Angeles County Coroner's office determined that Jackson, 50, died as a result of acute propofol intoxication.

Murray has pleaded not guilty to a felony charge of involuntary manslaughter and has admitted to giving Jackson propofol, a strong anesthetic usually used during surgery but allegedly employed by chronic insomniac Jackson as a sleep aid. Murray's lawyers have said the physician did not administer any drugs that "should have" caused Jackson's death. The investigation into his death was equally lengthy, lasting more than eight months, after which Los Angeles prosecutors charged that Murray gave the King of Pop a lethal combination of propofol and other painkillers and sedatives in the hours before the singer was found dead in his rented Los Angeles mansion on June 25, 2009. Murray faces up to four years in prison if convicted.

After hearing from both sides in the case at the January court date, the judge, Michael Pastor, will determine if there is enough evidence to mount a full trial.

Jackson's mother and father, Katherine and Joseph, were in court on Monday, according to Radar Online, sitting in the front row as Judge Pastor set the preliminary hearing date. Pastor granted a protective order covering all evidence in the criminal case, meaning it cannot be released to anyone other than the lawyers, paralegals and investigators in the case.

Murray's defense team reportedly asked for access to three fluids collected by the coroner's office, including ones taken from syringes and an IV tube to re-examine test results. Pastor ruled that the coroner's office must preserve the samples, and if defense attorneys and prosecutors cannot agree on the request, he will schedule a hearing on the matter.

After court let out, a group of Jackson supporters gathered and sang an impromptu verse that featured the lines, "Conrad Murray is a cold man," while holding up signs that read "Justice for Michael Jackson" and "Love Unites Us, Peace Drives Us, Judgment Day 4 All."

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My 5 favorite restaurants in Tai Po

barbecue pork

From late night street food to five-star restaurants, you can find the most delicious, mouth-watering food almost anywhere in Hong Kong. If you eat around the popular areas of Central, Causeway Bay, or Tsim Sha Tsui, many restaurants will be on the more expensive side.

But there are some places in Hong Kong with food that tastes just as good as, if not better than the fancy restaurants, minus the high price tag.

Let me introduce one of my favorite eating spots in Hong Kong: Tai Po. It is located in the New Territories, around 40 minutes by MTR from Central, but it is well worth the visit because it has some of the most delicious food in Hong Kong.

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Taylor Swift 'Needed' To Perform 'Innocent' At VMAs

'Having an album coming out that's called Speak Now ... I knew I needed to go to the VMAs,' singer says.
By Jocelyn Vena, with reporting by Jim Cantiello


Taylor Swift performs at the 2010 VMAs
Photo: Kevin Mazur/ WireImage

It was the question on everyone's mind when the VMAs went live from Los Angeles last month: Would Taylor Swift take the stage after last year's headline-making Kanye West interruption?

In the end, she did. And she bravely faced the crowd in the Nokia Theatre with a ballad inspired by the now-infamous incident and the man himself. The tune, "Innocent," let the world know it was time to move on.

"Well, the thing about performing songs that I've written is that when I'm performing them in concert or anytime that I'm singing those words, I'm back in the place where I was when I wrote the song," she told MTV News about the track, which will be on Speak Now, coming October 25.

"It's like that every single time, whether I'm singing a happy song or whether I'm singing a song about a very intense emotion, like I did on the VMAs."

Swift notes that she didn't have to perform "Innocent." She had released the uptempo "Mine" just as the VMAs were rolling around. But, for her, performing anything other than "Innocent" didn't feel like an option.

"I had a lot of options going into the VMAs: You can not go; you can perform your current single; you can pretend like nothing happened last year that everybody is not thinking about; or you can say what you need to say at the time that you need to say it," she explained. "And having an album coming out that's called Speak Now, that's about saying what you feel at the time, I knew I needed to go to the VMAs this year."

Did Swift make a good choice when she performed "Innocent" at the VMAs? Share your thoughts in the comments!

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