LOS ANGELES - MICHAEL Jackson was taking prescription drugs as he battled to get into shape for his gruelling concert comeback due to get underway in London next month, a lawyer for the family said on Thursday.

Jackson, who fought long-running battles with prescription medication throughout his career, was taking the drugs after suffering injuries during training for his comeback, attorney and spokesman Brian Oxman said.

The Los Angeles County Coroner confirmed the death of the 50-year-old 'King of Pop' here after he reportedly suffered a cardiac arrest.

Mr Oxman told CNN that he had harboured concerns about Jackson's use of drugs, saying members of the star's entourage were 'enablers' and comparing his case to the drug overdose death of Playboy centerfold Anna-Nicole Smith.

'This is not something that has been unexpected... because of the medications which Michael was under,' Mr Oxman said from the hospital where Jackson's family members had gathered.

'The people who have surrounded him have been enabling him... if you think that the case of Anna-Nicole Smith was an abuse, it was nothing to what we have seen in Michael Jackson's life.

'I do not know the extent of the medications that he was taking but the reports we had been receiving in the family is that they were extensive,' Mr Oxman added.

'When you warn people that this is what's going to happen and then it happens - where there's smoke there's fire.' Meanwhile Jackson's former publicist Michael Levine said in an email to AFP that he was unsurprised by the death.

'I must confess I am not surprised by today's tragic news,' Mr Levine said.

'Michael has been on an impossibly difficult and often self-destructive journey for years. His talent was unquestionable but so too was his discomfort with the norms of the world.

'A human simply can not withstand this level of prolonged stress.' -- AFP

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