The SQL syntax highlighter currently parses \' as \'; it does not consider the second backslash character escaped. It should treat \ as an escaped backslash and not attempt to escape the character following it.
This issue was posted for HeidiSQL and I had fixed it in SynHighlighterSQL.pas. See http://code.google.com/p/heidisql/issues/detail?id=3452
See attached screenie of how successive backslashes work currently.
Please note that SourceForge has removed some backslashes from my report. Looks like SF does not escape the backslashes when writing to their database. However, the report on GoogleCode shows the double backslases.
Tests:
one backslash: \ two backslashes: \
three backslashes: \\ four backslashes: \\