When Is Heroin Not Really Heroin? When It's at Michael Jackson's House

Family told assistant chief coroner they found tar heroin at Michael's house, but the dark stuff in the baggies proved to be something else

At this point, it's not as if there's anything they could have found at Michael Jackson's house that would shock us.

Unless they found tar heroin, of course. Which they did. Or at least, they thought they did.

Unidentified members of Jackson's family informed L.A. County Assistant Chief Coroner Ed Winter in June that they had "located a quantity of tar heroin in a bag" at the Holmby Hills mansion the King of Pop was renting at the time of his death, according to a search warrant executed on the residence that was unsealed Thursday.

Sure enough, the list of items carted away from the house included two instances of a "brn sticky solid substance in clear plastic baggy," per warrant lingo.

And tar heroin is basically dark-colored, sticky heroin. And what better place to keep it than in plastic baggies?

But...

Sources close to the case tell TMZ.com that the substance has been tested and was, in fact, not heroin of any type, color or consistency.

So, ix-nay on the eroin-hay. But there were plenty of other items seized that make perfect sense, now that we know Jackson apparently died after being injected with a combination of sedatives, including the potent anesthetic propofol.

LAPD Det. Orlando Martinez stated in the June 27 warrant that "upon viewing the decedent's body there were indications that he had received medication prior to his death." He also noted that cardiologist Conrad Murray, who is now the subject of a manslaughter investigation, was with Jackson when he died.

The search also turned up:

• Latanoprost Plus Solution liquid
• pill bottle containing 12 Temazenpan 30 mg pills
• tube containing Benoquin 20 content
• plastic bottle containing Valisone ointment
• baggy empty with medial label of Latanoprost
• empty box Nystatin and Triamcinolone ointment
• Fed Ex envelope with tracking number
• empty pill bottle of Lorazepam 2 mg
• empty pill bottle Diazepam 10 mg
• business cards
• baggy with medical label of Dr. Murray
• 2 cigarette packs of American Spirit
• cigarette papers
• four pill bottles empty
• one shaving case from the Palace

The June 27 warrant also authorized a search of Murray's BMW, which by that time had been impounded by authorities and towed away from Jackson's house.

At the time, officers were seeking any "patient records, prescription medicines, controlled substances, notes, diagrams, logs, journals, electronic memo devices, and computer storage devices relating to Michael Jackson. "

My, how nothing has changed as the case drags on.