A decide dominated that Britney Spears’ father, Jamie Spears, should sit for a deposition and produce all paperwork which can be being requested by the pop star’s crew. The decide ordered Spears’ father might be deposed inside the subsequent 30 days in Los Angeles.
Choose Brenda Penny ordered Spears’ father to supply all paperwork associated to digital surveillance. This transfer favors the singer, and signifies that the court docket believes it has motive to additional inquire into surprising allegations that Jamie Spears had employed a safety agency that put his daughter underneath surveillance all through her conservatorship, with allegations of monitoring her cellphone and bugging her bed room to report her personal conversations.
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Previous to the decide’s ruling on these motions, Jamie Spears’ legal professional, Alex Weingarten, requested the decide to offer his crew entry to paperwork from the singer’s crew to assist put together for his consumer’s deposition.
“It’s a deposition. Not an ambush,” Weingarten stated within the courtroom, earlier than Choose Penny dominated in opposition to his request.
The listening to on the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse was heated with fiery debate amongst Weingarten and the pop star’s legal professional, Mathew Rosengart.
Wednesday’s listening to marked a giant victory for the singer, who has been preventing in opposition to her father in a steady authorized battle ever since her conservatorship was terminated final yr.
Spears was put underneath a court-ordered conservatorship in 2008 by her father, who acted as her sole conservator for many of the 13 years. After greater than a decade of preventing in opposition to the association, Spears’ father was suspended by the court docket in September 2021, and the conservatorship was finally terminated in November 2021. Regardless of the singer’s newfound freedom, her authorized crew’s battle has remained messy with no decision from both aspect.
Nonetheless on the desk after Wednesday’s listening to is whether or not the singer might be deposed by her father’s crew.
The decide almost reached a call on that matter, first giving a tentative order to disclaim Jamie Spears’ movement to depose his daughter, however then determined to proceed the movement, asking the attorneys on each side to current their arguments to the court docket on why the singer ought to or shouldn’t sit for a deposition, forward of the July 27 listening to.
“You don’t sit down a sufferer for a deposition to be deposed by the victimizer,” Rosengart argued within the courtroom, telling the decide that sitting for a deposition could be “re-traumatizing” to the singer.
Final month, Weingarten filed paperwork on behalf of Jamie Spears, requesting to depose his daughter, in mild of her social media posts. Rosengart blasted the request, calling it a “revenge” and “sham.”
In court docket on Wednesday, Weingarten stated that having Spears sit for a deposition is par for the course, since she is a celebration within the case. Rosengart firmly disagreed, arguing that Spears’ father ought to have all the data he wants, on condition that he was the one who was operating her conservatorship and making choices about her life.
“Ms. Spears was in a conservatorship for 13 years that was run by her father,” Rosengart advised the decide. “Mr. Spears is the person who has documentation and first hand information…Mr. Spears and the documentation function the proof…Ms. Spears has no information or paperwork,” Rosengart continued, telling the decide that she is the sufferer on this state of affairs. “She’s not the accuser. She’s not the alleger,” he stated. “Ms. Spears isn’t a plaintiff right here. Ms. Spears isn’t a defendant right here.”
Rosengart advised the decide that his consumer’s father is simply submitting motions to “drive up charges,” as an alternative of letting his daughter “transfer on together with her life.”
“She is free, and Mr. Spears desires to suck her again into the conservatorship” for “improper, immoral causes,” Rosengart stated.
At one level, pleading with the decide to permit his crew to depose the pop star, Weingarten stated that “sadly” there are paperwork underneath seal and “court docket orders relating to” the digital surveillance. “Primarily based on what I do know,” he stated, “I think that Ms. Spears might be a treasure trove of knowledge.”
Weingarten stated that if the decide decides the singer doesn’t have to take a seat for a deposition, her father is not going to have his “honest day in court docket.” The legal professional stated he’s being held to a “completely different commonplace” than different events within the case, based mostly on “unproven allegations.”
“I recognize that it’s en vogue to trash Jamie Spears,” Weingarten advised the decide “However he has rights…On this nation, you’re harmless till confirmed responsible.”
“You don’t put a sufferer again in entrance of the victimizer. It’s the mistaken factor to do,” Rosengart shot again. “That may be mistaken, whether or not my consumer was Britney Spears or Jane Doe.”
“The mere deposition itself is harassment,” Rosengart advised the decide.
Rosengart has been preventing in opposition to Jamie Spears and the singer’s former enterprise supervisor, Tri Star Sports activities & Leisure, ever since he was retained by Spears in summer time 2021. He has accused the corporate of “stonewalling” his makes an attempt to acquire info for his consumer, refusing to cooperate and avoiding deposition. Spears’ authorized crew stated they’ve been requesting to depose the elder Spears for 9 months, and claimed he has evaded these requests. At Wednesday’s listening to, Choose Penny moved in favor of the star, agreeing that her father has failed to look for his deposition.
Earlier this month, in bombshell court docket paperwork, Rosengart claimed that his consumer’s father and Tri Star have been in cahoots to create the conservatorship and reap the advantages by taking hundreds of thousands of the celebrity’s hard-earned cash, somewhat than looking for her finest curiosity, which they deny. (Tri Star and its founder, Lou Taylor, served because the celebrity’s enterprise managers from 2008 by means of 2020, and the corporate was employed by Spears’ father across the time he positioned her underneath a conservatorship.) Rosengart claimed that Tri Star was instantly concerned in creating the conservatorship and acquired no less than $18 million all through it.
Legal professionals for Tri Star denied these claims, stating, “As all of the proof makes abundantly clear, the conservatorship was arrange on the advice of authorized counsel, not Tri Star, and authorised by the Court docket for greater than 12 years.”
Spears’ father and Tri Star have denied all claims of improper habits, regardless of been the topic of damning accusations. Whereas the surveillance allegations have largely targeted on Spears’ father and Black Field, the safety crew he was alleged to have employed, Tri Star has been on the heart of in depth claims of economic mismanagement.
A report within the New York Occasions alleged the star was underneath surveillance from a safety crew employed by her father and that Tri Star was concerned in monitoring the singer’s cellphone. On the time, a lawyer for Tri Star advised the Occasions, “These allegations usually are not true.” Earlier this month, Weingarten filed a sworn declaration from Jamie Spears, denying having any consciousness of his grownup daughter’s personal bed room being bugged or authorizing surveillance of the pop star. “I’m knowledgeable of the allegation by Britney’s counsel {that a} listening machine or ‘bug’ was positioned her bed room as surveillance through the Conservatorship,” the declaration acknowledged. “This allegation is fake.”
Weingarten didn’t communicate to members of the media after the listening to on Wednesday, however exterior of the courthouse, Rosengart advised reporters that his consumer desires to easily “transfer on.”
“Mr. Spears, if he loves his daughter, as he professes he does, ought to go away her alone,” Rosengart advised reporters, together with Selection. “He ought to get on along with his life, as an alternative of continuous to litigate in opposition to his daughter.”
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