- Music
- 15 Jul 21
Spears addressed the court again yesterday, telling the judge 'I would like to charge my father with conservatorship abuse'.
Britney Spears has been granted permission to appoint her own legal representation in her ongoing conservatorship case.
At the most recent hearing on Tuesday July 14th, Judge Brenda Penny approved Spears hiring former federal prosecutor Mathew Rosengart, who immediately called on her father, Jamie Spears to resign from her conservatorship.
Spears told the judge she approved of Rosengart after several conversations with him. She then addressed the court again, saying she wanted the conservatorship to end immediately but not if it meant going through any more "stupid" evaluations.
"I would like to charge my father with conservatorship abuse," she said, describing how she had been denied basic things like coffee, her driver’s license and even hair vitamins by the conservatorship. "If this is not abuse, I don’t know what is."
Until now, Samuel Ingham III had served as her court-appointed legal counsel since the beginning of her conservatorship in 2008, as Spears was previously deemed incapable of appointing her own lawyer.
Advertisement
He resigned last week in the wake of Spears testimony on June 23rd, following the resignations of her long-time manager Larry Randolph and the financial firm Bessemer Trust, who were co-conservators of her estate along with her father.
Spears' June 23rd testimony was the first time she has ever spoken freely and publicly about her 13 year conservatorship. She described how she had been forced to perform and to take medication against her wishes, that she wasn't permitted to remove her IUD and called her conservatorship is 'abusive'.
Fans from the #FreeBritney movement gathered outside the courthouse cheered the judge's decision to appoint Rosengart, then Rosengart himself when he walked out.
He has called into question whether the conservatorship should ever have been put into place back in 2008, and said he and a team of attorneys from his firm would be taking a close look at the details of the arrangement.
Lawyers for Jamie Spears said he would not be stepping down as Rosengart challenged, adding that he has only ever had his daughter’s best interests in mind.
Jamie's lawyer Vivian Thoreen said Britney Spears had many inaccurate beliefs, among them that "her father is responsible for all the bad things that have happened to her."
"Whether it’s misinformation, lack of correction, or being wrongly advised, I don’t know," she said, adding that for nearly two years James Spears has had no say over his daughter’s life choices, only her money.
Advertisement
After Spears harshly criticised her father in her June 23rd testimony, his lawyers called for an investigation in the claims she made, questioning the actions of both Ingham and her current personal conservator Jodi Montgomery
The filings, made on July 1st in LA, stated that "it is critical that the Court confirm whether or not Ms. Spears’s testimony was accurate in order to determine what corrective actions, if any, need to be taken."
It also requested that "all parties be provided a full and fair opportunity to respond to allegations and claims asserted against them.
He has also denied that he was the one in control of his daughter, pointing out that Jodi Montgomery had been his daughter's personal conservator since September 2019, however, many of Spears' claims of abusive behaviour predate Montgomery's appointment as her conservator.
He also opposed increased security measures for Montgomery after she allegedly received death threats due to Spears' more measured criticism of her in her testimony.
The next hearing date in Spears conservatorship case has yet to be announced, and it remains to be seen whether Rosengart will file for its end on her behalf.