Lawyer Wants Britney Spears To Testify in Restraining Order Case

In January, Britney Spears' father Jamie — who controls her financial and legal affairs via a conservatorship put in place after her hospitalizations in early 2008 — filed three restraining orders against men he believed were interfering in his daughter's life: her ex-manager, Sam Lutfi, her ex-boyfriend, Adnan Ghalib, and a lawyer who said Britney had asked him to fight the conservatorship named Jon Eardley. Eardley is now demanding that the singer go to court to justify the order when her Circus tour comes to Los Angeles' Staples Center later this week, E! reports. (When Spears' tour began, RS was there for a full report plus photos.)

Jamie Spears has been in court extending the restraining order against Eardley, saying the lawyer caused "substantial emotional distress" for his daughter. Eardley is requesting Spears testify on her behalf as to whether she did try to hire him to contest the conservatorship — as it stands now, Jamie will remain in control of Britney's affairs for an indefinite period of time — and whether he caused her distress. At a recent court date at which Lutfi fought his own restraining order, the judge heard an audio recording of a voice message allegedly left by Britney Spears during which she asks for help battling the conservatorship.

If Spears is unable to attend court this week, Eardley asks that she's forced to submit an oral deposition. "If Britney Spears is well enough to put on two concerts in Los Angeles she is certainly well enough to attend a trial where attorneys on her behalf have falsely accused Jon Eardley of harassment," reads his court petition.

After writing her Britney Spears cover story for Rolling Stone in December 2008, Jenny Eliscu questioned the conservatorship. "Because it is designed, ideally, to protect people who are seriously ill. We're talking about people who are non compos mentis, according to the lawyers I consulted," she said. "Or they're in a vegetative state. Or they're just so old that they can't take care of themselves anymore. But Britney? It was making less and less sense as time went on."

Related Stories:

• Behind the Britney Story: A Conversation with Writer Jenny Eliscu
• Britney Spears' Life in Photos: A Timeline of the Star's Rise, Fall and Comeback
• Britney Spears: The Complete Video Guide

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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