Accused in Michael Jackson's Death, Doc Can Still Practice Medicine
Almost a year after the death of Michael Jackson, the personal physician charged with involuntary manslaughter for allegedly administering a lethal dose of a powerful anesthetic is still practicing medicine in California, Nevada and Texas.
And a California judge said today that it wouldn’t be appropriate for him to prevent Dr. Conrad Murray from doing so, since that would require him to overrule a fellow jurist on the state superior court bench, reports the Associated Press.
Earlier restrictions on Murray’s administering propofol, the anesthetic found to have caused Jackson’s death, continue in place, however. They were imposed on Murray after he was arraigned in February by Superior Court Judge Keith Schwartz.
“There is oftentimes in the real world a belief that judges can make up the rules as they go through a case,” said Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor today as he conducted a hearing in the case in Los Angeles.
But, under the law, “I do not have the ability to revisit a ruling by one of my colleagues,” he explained, because it would put him in the position of an appellate judge.
The government, which sought the ban, can of course appeal his ruling, the judge noted. And it would also be possible for the state medical board to suspend Murray’s license to practice medicine after an administrative hearing, the news agency reports.
Murray has pleaded not guilty to the criminal charge and has repeatedly said he did nothing that should have caused Jackson’s death.
