In January, we learned that Jamie Spears had been hospitalized for more than a month because of a serious issue with his colon. Jamie was, at the time, Britney Spears’ primary conservator and responsible for taking care of Britney on a daily basis. Jamie provided Britney with the structure she needs, and he oversees everything from her medication to her tours and residencies to her finances. He determines which doctors are best for her, he has veto authority on her boyfriends, and he keeps track of who is in her life. Britney does not have many legal rights under the conservatorship – it’s like she’s legally a minor child. This is incidentally why she has no visitation or custodial rights over her sons – any time she has with Jayden and Sean is because Kevin allows her to see them.
When Jamie was in the hospital, Britney announced the cancellation of her then-newly announced Vegas residency. Jamie was still in bad shape, reportedly, and he was in need of full-time care, which Britney is legally and mentally incapable of providing. A month later, her co-conservator Andrew Wallet very suddenly pulled out of the conservatorship too. In the first week of April, an announcement was made: Britney was checking into a mental health facility for a 30-day intensive treatment. Then a week ago, E! News reported that Britney was out in LA, getting her hair done. There were some social media photos of it as evidence. Did she leave the treatment facility? What’s even going on? Well, something seems to be happening. I’ll let Newsweek summarize:
Britney Spears checked herself into a mental health institution on April 3, but some claim that may not be true. A Tuesday episode of Britney’s Gram podcast revealed a concerning voicemail from an unnamed, former member of Spears’ legal team who claimed the pop icon has been held against her will in a facility since early January, and there’s no telling when she’ll be released. The hashtag #FreeBritney soon started trending on Twitter, as thousands of fans began to worry for the star’s safety.
Podcast hosts Barbara Grey and Tess Barker claimed Spears’s conservatorship, money and health, could be reasons why Spears was checked into a facility without her approval. Legally, it’s a possibility that Spears’s father, Jamie Spears, has ordered his daughter to get help even if she wasn’t initially receptive. Spears has been legally confined to a conservatorship since 2008, though she has tried to fight it, and was found mentally unfit to hire a lawyer, according to Britney’s Gram podcast.
The voicemail from the anonymous person claimed Spears was not taking her medication, which caused her father to pull his support from her Domination Las Vegas residency. The show was canceled in the first week of January, Spears announcing she was heartbroken but had to take time for her father’s deteriorating health. Spears seemingly broke another giant rule: she’s not allowed to drive a car under her conservatorship, but was seen driving with boyfriend Sam Asghari. The unnamed caller claimed he had quit Britney’s team two weeks prior, and his identity was said to be confirmed by Grey and Barker.
Another clue that led the podcast hosts to the assumption Spears is being held against her will is the resignation of her former co-conservator Andrew Wallet. The lawyer resigned from his position on Spears’ estate in March after 10 years, asking a court to grant him immediate release in passionate wording. “Substantial detriment, irreparable harm and immediate danger will result to the conservatee and her estate if the relief requested herein in not granted on an ex parte basis,” he stated, as reported by The Blast.
Rumors that Spears is unconsenting to mental health treatment are unconfirmed. Spears and team, Sam Asghari, Jamie Lynn Spears and Kevin Federline did not immediately respond to Newsweek’s request for comment on Spears’ consent of treatment, or her current state.
Lynn Spears has also been “liking” social media messages that are about Britney being kept at a mental health facility against her will. I think the theory is that Jamie Spears is ailing and in very poor health, and he basically sent Britney away, and had her locked up in a mental health facility so he didn’t have to micromanage her while he was struggling physically. I think that’s legitimately possible. I also think it’s legitimately possible that Britney was truly falling apart without her dad there to order her to take her meds and provide the structure and schedule she needs to stay focused and centered. Like, all things could be true: Jamie had selfish and unselfish reasons for “locking her away” and Britney was genuinely struggling. And the nature of the conservatorship does mean that Jamie has the legal right to have her held at a facility. It’s sad but true.
As for the theory that Britney has been trying to free herself from the conservatorship for a while… I feel comfortable accusing Jamie Spears of taking more than his fair share of Britney’s earnings, and for not wanting to open up her finances to Kevin Federline’s audit (mysterious how quickly that went away, huh?). But I think if Jamie truly believed Britney was capable of living without the conservatorship, he would have moved to remove it. Britney has advocates beyond her father, and it says something that after a decade under the conservatorship, no one around Britney wants it removed.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid and WENN.
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