Physician to surrender in Jackson’s death

LOS ANGELES -- Michael Jackson's doctor has agreed to surrender to authorities today to face a criminal case stemming from the singer's death, his lawyer said Thursday.

Attorney Ed Chernoff said Dr. Conrad Murray agreed to turn himself in after discussions with the prosecutor handling the case. Details about how he would surrender were still being worked out.

"You tell us where; we'll be there," Chernoff said in a Thursday night posting on his Web site.

It was not clear when Murray would be arraigned. Los Angeles County sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said it would not happen today.

Word that Murray would surrender came after a day of haggling between prosecutors, defense lawyers and law enforcement officials over whether the physician should be arrested or allowed to turn himself in.

Officials from the Los Angeles Police Department, which spent the past seven months investigating Murray, were unhappy with the idea of him surrendering and wanted to go to the residence he was staying at to arrest him, a law enforcement official said.

Various factors figured into the desire to arrest Murray, including the possibility he might flee before arraignment, said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly and requested anonymity. Police officials also worried it could appear Murray was being given special treatment if he was allowed to turn himself in.

Murray has a practice in Houston and an office and home in Las Vegas.

The official said the district attorney's office opposed an early plan for detectives to make the arrest Friday morning, upsetting police higher-ups, and negotiated with Murray's attorneys to allow the doctor to turn himself in.

District attorney's spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons could not immediately confirm Chernoff's assertion that Murray would surrender today.

"I cannot vouch for the truth of that statement," Gibbons said.

Chernoff said earlier Thursday that an arrest would be purely for the benefit of news cameras.

"It's a waste of time, it's just a show," Chernoff said. "There's no reason to handcuff a guy, drag him downtown so you can take a photo when he's been sitting here for a week waiting to turn to himself in."

Gibbons denied there was any discord between the Police Department and the district attorney's office and said police and prosecutors had been fully cooperating since the case began.

"There is no big dispute," Gibbons said. "We are getting along fine."