Britney Spears’ Battle with Her Dad is Headed to a Trial

Britney Spears’ battle with her dad is headed to a trial.

At a heated hearing in a Los Angeles courtroom Wednesday, lawyers for the pop star and her dad Jamie Spears clashed over whether he placed a listening device in her bedroom and mismanaged her finances. But they ultimately agreed on one thing — an evidentiary hearing is needed.

Judge Brenda Penny agreed, and, before a break, she said the mini-trial likely would be transferred to another courtroom, because it appeared destined to last several days.

In one fiery exchange, Britney’s lawyer, Mathew Rosengart, accused Jamie’s lawyer, Alex Weingarten, of sidestepping the issue of “whether or not his client knew about electronic eavesdropping on my client,” including “the placing of a listening device in the bedroom of my client.”

“Didn’t happen, your honor,” Weingarten shot back, cutting Rosengart off after alleging earlier during the hearing that perhaps Rosengart “planted” the story about the listening device in the New York Times.

“He just made accusations that are disgraceful, and he should be ashamed. He says it didn’t happen? Let’s see what Mr. Spears says under oath when he’s deposed,” Rosengart said.

Rosengart suggested an evidentiary hearing on disputed issues related to the conservatorship’s stewardship and accounting be set in the next 150 days. Weingarten said it should be sooner, possibly in the next 90 days.

The pop star was freed from her nearly 14-year conservatorship on Nov. 12 after blowing the doors off the legal arrangement with back-to-back statements to Judge Penny in June and July. In her live addresses heard around the world, the “Toxic” singer said her conservatorship, largely controlled by her father, was “cruel” and “abusive” as it dictated her finances, health care, and personal life for most of her adult life.

Once she hired Rosengart, a former federal prosecutor, she started an aggressive campaign to investigate claims her dad mismanaged her millions and used “bullying conduct” to keep her in line.

She and Rosengart hired the accounting and intelligence firm Kroll for a forensic review of the controversial conservatorship, and last Friday filed new paperwork summarizing the probe so far. In a sworn statement, Kroll executive Sherine Ebadi, a ex-FBI agent, said she found a “pattern of misconduct” that raises possible “criminal implications.”

Most notably, she said she personally debriefed Britney’s former security staffer, Alex Vlasov, at the Hotel Bel-Air and found him to be “highly credible.” Vlasov is the whistleblower who previously told the New York Times that his former boss Edan Yemini, CEO of Black Box Security, placed a secret listening device in Britney’s bedroom in 2016 and used surveillance technology that captured the singer’s privileged communications with her lawyer.

“Mr. Vlasov regularly overheard Mr. Yemini updating Mr. Spears on the contents of the phone devices used by his daughter,” Ebadi wrote in her statement.

“Mr. Yemeni and Black Box have always conducted themselves within professional, ethical, and legal bounds, and they are particularly proud of their work in keeping Ms. Spears safe for many years,” Yemini’s civil lawyer Shawn Holley previously told Rolling Stone.