Summary Michael Jackson's former doctor Conrad Murray was released from jail Monday.
LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Michael Jackson s former doctor Conrad Murray was released from jail Monday after serving two years of a four-year sentence for the late pop icon s death in 2009, officials said.
Murray, who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in 2011 for giving Jackson the drug that killed him, left the Men s Central Jail in Los Angeles shortly after midnight.
His release was brought forward due to good behavior and prison overcrowding.
The 60-year-old medic evaded a group of hecklers outside the jail, where a small group of Jackson fans booed his release.
"I m just happy he s finally out," said his lawyer Valerie Wass, who is expected to represent Murray in an appeal against his conviction, filed in April this year.
"They didn t release him one minute early," she said, according to the LA Times.
Jackson died on June 25, 2009 from an overdose of the anesthetic propofol at his rented mansion in the plush Holmby Hills district west of Los Angeles.
Murray was jailed for four years in November 2011 for giving Jackson propofol to help him sleep as he rehearsed for a comeback series of concerts in London, four years after the pop star s acquittal on child molestation charges.
Earlier this month a jury rejected a civil lawsuit brought by Jackson s family, who claimed that tour promoter AEG Live negligently hired Murray, a cardiologist, to take care of the star for the doomed "This Is It" tour.
Murray s whereabouts after his release were not immediately clear. "He was released ... safely and securely," said LA County sheriff s spokesman, adding that the doctor had been released to "representatives."
Although he mostly escaped waiting photographers at the jail, TMZ caught up with him at a burger joint, in what it said was his "first stop" after being released.
In the pictures Murray looked significantly grayer and thinner than his last public appearance before he was jailed, as he sat at an outdoor table at an In n Out burger fast-food restaurant.
There has been speculation that Murray, who had financial problems even before he was hired to look after Jackson, could make money by telling his side of the story, in a book or other form.
Murray s lawyer told reporters that Murray will try to reinstate his medical licences in California, Nevada and Texas -- where he was a registered doctor before Jackson s death -- in order to resume his medical career.
The doctor s financial woes were details in both his own criminal trial and the civil trial pitting the Jackson family and AEG Live.
Evidence presented in court suggested he had huge debts and saw the Jackson job as a way to put his finances back in order.
Initially he asked for $5 million to look after the self-styled King of Pop during rehearsals and the concert series in London, but AEG Live refused this, and he eventually settled for $150,000 a month.
But he was never paid before Jackson s death, because he was never formally hired. A copy of a contract, signed by Murray but not by AEG Live, was found in the doctor s car the day after Jackson s death.
In an interview from prison after the civil trial ended, Murray was asked what he planned to do after his release.
"I will restart my life and, God willing, I will be a model to show the world that despite adversity, and when bad things happen to good people, they can restart their life and succeed," he told the "Today" show.
