“You shouldn’t believe something just because a lawyer wrote it down,” says Kevin Federline’s family lawyer as a tip to the paparazzi.
That said, Sam Lutfi offers his most recent allegations against Britney Spears and her family in pursuit of records he believes will support his case against Jamie, Lynne and Britney Spears.
[Read more...]
Blair Berk, former attorney of Lindsay Lohan arrives at a Los Angeles courthouse to defend Lindsay Lohan, Aug. 23, 2007. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
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I’m curious. Blair Berk is a heavyweight (not fat) attorney based in Los Angeles yet two media outlets kept her name out of the media this weekend.
TMZ reported yesterday that Samuel Barth filed for a protective order against Sam Lutfi yet said nothing about Berk who filed papers on Barth’s behalf.
Radaronline, lesser known than TMZ but proven in courtroom reporting, likewise omitted Berk from their story on Lutfi and Barth. They claimed today the FBI is investigating Lutfi but no mention of the intriguing relationships between Berk, Lutfi and Barth.
I‘m short on time, but I wanted to tell you about another twist in the story involving Courtney Love Cobain and Britney Spears.
Courtney Love performs at a private concert in the Hiro Ballroom at The Maritime Hotel on July 12, 2007 in New York. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow) Permission by the Puma Press.
There is so much more going on than that and I will be revealing that in what I hope is a front page article on the Puma Press. That’s the name of the newspaper at the community college where I pursuing journalism as a second career.
Suffice for now, Love is well represented in the guardianship case by none other than Anne Kiley and Mary Dinius White of the law firm Trope and Trope in conjunction with related money matters involving the Pryor Cashman law firm.
You might remember Anne Kiley during the time she represented Britney Spears in her custody case with Kevin Federline. You might also remember that when the conservatorship of Spears began in early 2008 that Jamie Spears axed Trope and Trope early on.
You might further recall that it was Trope and Trope who referred Adam Streisand to Britney when she was trying to get out of the conservatorship in February 2008?
That’s all I have for you right now but there is so much more coming such as the possible removal of Geraldine Wyle from the case. Do you all remember Wyle from a previous article I wrote about the disqualification of a judge by Love in the guardianship case?
No sense in staying tuned. I would never lead you along and I hope the details I am to provide in a very big story (to my mind) will have been worth the wait. Thank you.
p.s. I got to finish cleaning the house, run to Whole Foods (company is coming!), make spaghetti and meatballs and relax with friends over to play Euchre and listen to music. Yeh, baby.
UPDATE: To be fair, Trope and Trope filed a motion to be relieved as counsel on Jan. 2, 2008, says the case summary. They filed a declaration in support on Feb. 8. Jamie Spears did not oppose. Sorry I was writing at a clip.
Britney Spears made her second court appearance in two years in her conservatorship case on Jan. 22. It was her third court appearance since late 2007. This illustration was provided by the permission of Mona Shafer Edwards at www.monaedwards.com. The image is by the courtesy of www.killthelights.org.
Britney Spears is not required or expected to be at a status hearing in the conservatorship scheduled for Tuesday, said Liz Martinez of the Los Angeles Superior Court’s public affairs office on Friday. I am telling you due to rumors I’ve been hearing.
Even if she were to be there, I wouldn’t trust the media to tell me what really happened.
On Jan. 22, headlines buried the significance of a Spears appearance: it was only the second time in two years of being under a conservatorship by her father that she met with Commissioner Reva Goetz.
Courtney Love arrives for the 2009 Elle Style Awards at Big Sky studios in north London on Feb. 9, 2009. (AP Photo/Joel Ryan) By permission of the Puma Press.
Update: Courtney Love Cobain retweeted this story today. She offered no corrections or additional comments. Be sure to check out Misc. Court Docs. There’s a document at the top for you Love fans.
Update II: Feb. 19. Love says Judge Mitchell Beckloff recused himself but she waived it.
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A new judge has been assigned to the guardianship matter of Frances Bean Cobain and a related temporary restraining order against her mother, Courtney Love.
The case was transferred to Judge Mitchell Beckloff on Jan. 22 in Los Angeles County.
Commissioner Reva Goetz was disqualified by a California Code of Civil Procedure Section 170.6 challenge, said Liz Martinez, a public affairs office representative.
Section 170.6 provides that no judge, commissioner or referee shall try any civil or criminal matter when it is established that there is prejudice against any party, attorney or the interest of any party or attorney appearing in the action or proceeding, says the state’s Web site.
The challenge may have been based in connection to Britney and Jamie Spears.
Courtesy of JFXonline.com Oct. 2009
Update, Jan. 28: I will complete this story soon but there is a key source I would still like to talk to that would tell more of the process servers’side of the story.
Evidence has surfaced that may explain why prosecutors allowed Adnan Ghalib to avoid a potential seven year jail sentence and to serve 45 days instead on felony charges lodged in Feb. 2009 for allegedly striking a process server with his car.
The underreported facts suggest a scene in which Ghalib may have felt threatened.
Ram Moskowitz, the alleged victim and process server in the incident, filed a declaration with the Los Angeles Superior Court on Feb. 23, 2009, the same day that the public and the judge heard testimony from Britney Spears’father, Jamie Spears, in support of the restraining order he sought against Ghalib that led to the events of Feb. 11.
Moskowitz testifies that he was not alone in the alleyway that day outside of Ghalib’s ex-wife’s apartment and that he was with another agent, Jesse Martell who remained in a vehicle. Moskowitz also says that Ghalib had already been served with the same temporary restraining order that he was allegedly trying to give him.
Moskowitz says that he previously filed proof of service on Ghalib, prior to filing the declaration on Feb. 23 and that his co-worker, Jason Alexander, served Ghalib on Feb. 2.
The declaration first surfaced on Feb. 27, 2009 on celebrity news site TMZ, however TMZ omitted information that may have made the public more sympathetic to Ghalib’s situation on the charges of assault with a deadly weapon, battery with serious bodily injury, and hit and run causing death or injury as alleged by the prosecution. TMZ instead created an obvious negative character from the declaration.
“The process server who was allegedly hit by a Mercedes driven by Adnan Ghalib made it clear in a court declaration — Adnan could have killed him.
“Ram Moskowitz (first name, first clue) claims when he tried serving Adnan with Britney Spears’TRO, Adnan gunned his car and hit him. The force propelled Ram onto the hood. He claims “I stayed on the hood … for about 30 to 40 yards, at which point I was thrown off…””
If the case gone to trial before a jury (Ghalib pled no contest in October to leaving the scene of an accident) the jurors might also have learned that Moskowitz and Martell both had permits to carry firearms and could legally expose those firearms while on duty. Moskowitz applied for a firearm permit on Jan. 23, 2009. He was granted the permit on Jan. 26, 2009, just days before Ghalib was served on Feb. 2, according to online records available through the Department of Consumer Affair’s Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. Martell has had a permit since 1995 and a private investigator’s license that was issued in 1992. He also has his own private company called Martell Investigations.
When asked about the permits and if he and Moskowitz were carrying their firearms on Feb. 11 Martell says, “How do you know that information? If you already know that why are you asking?”
But later he says in response to the same question, “We weren’t carrying firearms. You don’t need a firearm to serve a subpoena.”
More coming soon…after finals week?
Credit: Courtesy of author.
Steve Dennis speaks via an email interview about his book, “Britney: Inside the Dream.” Dennis takes both Fair News Spears questions and to those of a bona fide Britney Spears fan who wishes anonymity.
Dennis is the recognized ghostwriter for Paul Burrell who published two books from his life of service to the Queen of England and to the late Diana, Princess of Wales.
You have a number of unnamed sources in your book. What was the most common reason people didn’t want to use their name?
Some sources are named, some not. Some people cannot be seen to be co-operating but they wanted to assist a compassionate and true portrait of Britney. I think there is a perception that if one co-operates with a biographer, it amounts to betrayal. Within that perception, people seek anonymity. Besides, it’s the information that counts, not the names. The phrase “a source said” has been devalued, I think, in journalism over the years but the authenticity of a source’s contribution can be found within the detail and insight.
A judge ruled yesterday that a lawsuit against Britney by a former member of her security team will go forward to a jury trial set for May 2010 according to the Los Angeles Superior Court case summary.
The suit was filed by Kerry M. Vine against Spears and his former employer Advanced Security Concepts (ASC), a security team that works for her father and the conservatorship based on 2009 expenses filed by Jamie Spears earlier this year. Vine wants compensation for negligence, infliction of emotional distress and loss of wages says the complaint he filed in May 2009.
ASC was dismissed from the case at the end of July and Gallagher Bassett Services, a company that insures employers against workmen’s compensation claims, was added per the case summary.
In the original complaint, Vine claims that ASC ordered him to perform duties that resulted in physical injuries and damage to his personal property and self. He claims Britney negligently operated her home and business thereby causing his injuries since ASC was employed by the defendants (Britney and ASC) at the time. He also claims that the defendants’ extreme and outrageous conduct intentionally and recklessly caused him severe emotional distress.
Spears’ ex-manager Sam Lutfi amended his complaint for libel and defamation damages to include the publisher of her mother’s book Through the Storm, A Real Story of Fame and Family in a Tabloid World, last Friday according to new filings at a Los Angeles County courthouse.
The move came after Lynne Spears filed an appeal on Aug. 11, 2009 against a judge’s earlier decision to uphold Lutfi’s case. In short, the judge ruled that it was uncontested that Lynne had published a book, and that testimony namely by Lutfi, Adnan Ghalib, Britney’s ex-boyfriend, and Felipe Texeira, a paparazzo, established a legal basis to uphold Lutfi’s suit.
A Los Angeles Superior Court judge canceled a scheduled conservatorship review case yesterday because there was nothing to talk about.
Courtesy of Kill the Lights Sep 2009
The purpose of the review was to determine whether Spears could testify in a lawsuit against her by former manager Johnny Wright. That suit was settled and dismissed Jul. 9, 2009 in an Orange County, Fla. courthouse. However, the review was not taken off the calendar until yesterday or late last Friday afternoon.
Meanwhile, an erroneous report by The Associated Press circled the Internet yesterday suggesting the review had been canceled due to attorneys who represent Jamie Spears in the conservatorship, being required elsewhere in proceedings involving Michael Jackson’s children yesterday.
