MJ's Doc a Focus of Manslaughter Probe
July 23, 2009— -- Search warrants suggest Dr. Conrad Murray, the personal physician who was with Michael Jackson at his California rental home when the singer died last month, is a specific target of a police manslaughter investigation, and searches of his office and a storage facility yielded drugs, documents and computer hard drives.
The search warrants told police they were "commanded to search ... for property or items constituting evidence of the offense of manslaughter that tend to show that Dr. Conrad Murray committed the said criminal offense."
Both facilities were searched Wednesday, and the warrants instructed authorities to ship any evidence found to officials in California.
Murray's lawyer, Edward Chernoff, said Wednesday that the search warrant for the office gave police the power to look for anything that "they believed constituted evidence of the offense of manslaughter."
Among the items seized from the office were a vial containing 27 tablets of the weight loss drug phentermine, a vial containing a tablet of the muscle relaxant clonazepam, a photocopy picture of Murray, Rolodex cards, public storage receipts, and a receipt for a "Cricket" phone, according to a receipt attached to the warrant.
Cricket phones essentially are untraceable, because the company requires no contracts, no credit checks and no set-up fees, according to a sales representative for the company. Cricket also has the "PAYGo" option, which means someone can go to a store and pay for phone minutes with cash.
Other items seized from the storage unit, according to the court records, included two computer hard drives and a "Texas Department of Public Safety controlled substance registration." Authorities also obtained a suspension notice from a Houston hospital.
Click on the following links to examine Monday's search warrant for Murray's office and a list of what was seized and Wednesday's search warrant for his storage facility and what was seized there. The documents were obtained by ABC News Houston affiliate KTRK.
The warrants, signed by Harris County, Texas, District Court Judge Shawna Reagin Monday and Wednesday, specifically directed officers to "seize and examine all items including but not limited to, billing records, medication orders, transport receipts, billing receipts, medical records and computerized medical records, for implements and instruments used in the commission of a crime."
Investigators looking into Jackson's death believe that someone was intravenously administering propofol, a powerful sedative, to Jackson at his home.
Propofol was not listed on the court documents among the items seized from Murray's property.
Medical experts have soundly agreed that a drug like propofol, which is typically used in the hospital to sedate patients for surgery or other medical procedures, should not be used in the home.
Murray's lawyers have maintained for weeks that the doctor was simply a witness in Jackson's death and had nothing to do with it.
