THE TRUTH ABOUT MICHAEL'S DEATH

DR. CONRAD MURRAY TOOK THE BLAME WHEN MICHAEL JACKSON DIED IN 2009 - BUT NEW INFORMATION IS SHEDDING LIGHT ON WHAT REALLY KILLED THE KING OF POP.

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IT was a bizarre scene. When paramedic and firefighter Richard Senneff responded to a 911 call and arrived at the rented home of Michael Jackson on June 25, 2009, he found the pop star unresponsive in his bed, surrounded by oxygen tanks and IVs. Conrad Murray, Michael's private doctor, frantically tried to revive the singer before he was taken to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead after suffering a cardiac arrest. His bedside table was littered with prescription medicine bottles, and the room was reportedly littered with medical paraphernalia, including latex gloves, drug vials and syringes.

The King of Pop was dead at age 50. More shocking, his death was officially ruled a homicide: The medical examiner determined that a lethal cocktail of prescription medications. - including the anesthetic propofol, which had been administered by Dr. Murray - had caused the heart attack. Two years later, Dr. Murray was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to four years in prison (he served two). But doctors and those who were close to Michael know that's not the whole story and they're finally telling all. "It's a lot more complicated than just: Dr. Murray was at his bedside when he died," says LAPD detective Orlando Martinez in the new TMZ documentary series, Who Killed Michael Jackson? A source tells Star, "Michael was dancing with death for a long time before he died."

DANGEROUS DESCENT

The trouble began in 1984, when Michael suffered severe burns when pyrotechnics on the set of a Pepsi commercial ignited his hair. The painkillers he was prescribed to help him bear the second-degree burns marked the beginning of his spiral into addiction. He later said he became "increasingly more dependent" on them while touring.