A Beverly Hills nurse anesthetist told a jury today that he safely administered propofol to Michael Jackson 14 times from 2000-03 while assisting physicians during various procedures in hospital settings.
Questioned by AEG Live attorney Kathryn Cahan, David Fournier said the entertainer sometimes asked that aliases such as Omar Arnold be used on his medical records. The treatments included collagen and Botox injections, scalp reductions and even a root canal, Fournier testified.
Fournier said that it is important that a patient be monitored carefully after being given any kind of anesthesia and that the drugs be administered in a proper medical arena. He said that before Jackson’s death, he never heard of anyone administering propofol to a patient complaining of insomnia.
Dr. Conrad Murray was convicted in 2011 of involuntary manslaughter for giving the singer a lethal intravenous dose of the powerful anesthetic as a sleep aid and was sentenced to four years in jail.
Propofol’s benefits over other types of anesthetics are that the patient wakes up quickly and usually has little or no nausea, Fournier testified.
Fournier said he was present for procedures administered to Jackson that in total spanned about a decade. He said the singer’s weight varied during that period from 130 to 140 pounds.
Asked by Cahan to discuss some of the entertainer’s medical records displayed on courtroom screens, Fournier identified the types of drugs administered as well as Jackson’s characteristic consent signature at the bottom, which featured large letters and sweeping strokes.
“Michael signed everything with a flourish,” Fournier said.
He was called to the stand as a defense witness in trial of the negligence/wrongful death lawsuit that family matriarch Katherine Jackson filed in Los Angeles Superior Court in September 2010 against AEG Live, the promoter of her late son’s planned comeback tour.
The suit, which also names the singer’s three children as plaintiffs, alleges that AEG hired Murray as the pop star’s physician for the tour and failed to supervise him properly. But AEG maintains it was Jackson who hired Murray in 2006 as his personal physician and chose him to be his doctor during his “This Is It” concerts.
- City News Service
Source: beverlyhills.patch / MJ-Upbeat.com
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