Prosecution Witness Calls Dr. Conrad Murray’s Behavior ‘Completely and Utterly Inexcusable’

During yesterday's testimony, prosecution witness Dr. Steven Shafer, an expert on the powerful drug propofol, called the behavior of Michael Jackson's doctor "completely and utterly inexcusable." Those are not exactly words you want to hear associated with a doctor and how he treats patients.

Shafer criticized Dr. Conrad Murray, who is on trial for manslaughter, for many of his actions as Jackson's physician, both leading up to and on the day of his death, saying that giving Jackson the anaesthetic propofol as a sleep aid was "unconscionable," according to Billboard.

Shafer said, "We are in pharmacological never-never land here, something that was done to Michael Jackson and no one else in history to my knowledge," he told jurors. He was also shocked that Murray did not immediately call 911 upon discovering that his patient was not breathing. Shafer put it simply: "I almost don't know what to say. That is so completely and utterly inexcusable."

Overall, Shafer categorized Murray's handling of Jackson as more like that of an employee than a patient, and declared that he never should have honored Jackson's request to use the anaesthetic propofol as a sleep aid.

Shafer's most damning statement to that effect? :"Saying yes is not what doctors do. A competent doctor would know you do not do this. If a patient requests something frivolous or dangerous, it is the doctor's responsibility to say no."