Britney Spears‘ former attorney Matthew Rosengart, who was instrumental in freeing her from the restrictive conservatorship that controlled her life from 2008 to 2021, recently spoke out in support of the pop icon.
GettyUS Weekly reported on Friday, March 13 that Rosengart gave them the following statement:
“It was my great honor to work with and protect Britney as her litigator, and I will always be proud of her and the work we did together, ranging from helping, at her request and direction, to restore her freedom, civil rights and civil liberties after a 13-year conservatorship that stripped her of those rights, to many other matters.“
Rosengart added that “Britney will always be an icon” before saying “I’ll always care greatly about her and help and support her in any way I can.”
Page Six recently reported Spears’ two sons are also being support, and plan to spend time with her after recently moving back to the L.A. area from Hawaii.
Britney Spears Enlisted Matthew Rosengart to Help End Her Conservatorship in 2021
During a 24-minute statement Britney made to the court during a June 2021 hearing where she spoke against her conservatorship via a remote phone appearance, she told the court she had previously been blocked from hiring an attorney to represent her, in a statement Variety transcribed in full.
In one part of the statement, she described feeling threatened into doing a tour, saying:
My management said if I don’t do this tour, I will have to find an attorney, and by contract my own management could sue me if I didn’t follow through with the tour. He handed me a sheet of paper as I got off the stage in Vegas and said I had to sign it. It was very threatening and scary. And with the conservatorship, I couldn’t even get my own attorney. So out of fear, I went ahead and I did the tour.
Despite being a multi-millionaire, Spears was previously represented by a court-appointed attorney, Samuel D. Ingham III, who was appointed by Judge Reva Goetz in 2008.
During her 2021 court appearance, she complained that Ingham discouraged her from speaking out about her grievances with the conservatorship. She explained:
“My lawyer, Sam (Ingham), has been very scared for me to go forward because he’s saying if I speak up, I’m being overworked in that facility of that rehab place, that rehab place will sue me. He told me I should keep it to myself. I would personally like to – actually, I’ve grown with a personal relationship with Sam, my lawyer, I’ve been talking to him like three times a week now, we’ve kind of built a relationship but I haven’t really had the opportunity by my own self to actually handpick my own lawyer by myself. And I would like to be able to do that.“
Documentary Says Britney Spears Attempted to Hire an Attorney In 2009
The Netflix documentary revealed a January 2009 attempt by Spears to hire an attorney of her own choice, John T. Anderson. Music journalist Jenny Eliscu, and Spears’ controversial former assistant Sam Lutfi worked together to form the plan, Eliscu says. “Sam explained to me that I would need to go to the Montage and she would be waiting for me, and she would know to come meet me in the bathroom,” she revealed.
Eliscu said she walked in pretending to be a guest, and took the elevator up to a pool area where Spears was swimming alone with a couple of security guards nearby. “She was just leaning on the edge of the pool, and I kind of gave her a little side-eye and saw her see me,” Eliscu recalled.
She says she entered a small bathroom, where she ducked into a stall and got the pen and papers ready for Spears to sign.
She says Spears signed before looking into her face and saying, “Thank you.” Eliscu broke down in tears as she recalled, “I said, ‘I’ll see you again.’ Go.’ She definitely seemed scared.”
The petition to be represented by the new attorney stated Spears felt her court-appointed attorney, Sam Ingham, was “not advocating adequately on her behalf particularly in light of the severe restrictions placed upon her.”
The papers argued, “Certainly, this woman who can complete two new CDs and be set to go on a national tour, has sufficient capacity, after nearly one year of a protective conservatorship, to retain counsel of her choice and in whom she has confidence.”
Eliscu said about a week after her secret rendezvous with the singer, she found out that “it was all over,” and that, similar to what had happened when Spears previously attempted to hire another attorney, Adam Streisand, it had been ruled that Spears “lacked the capacity to choose a lawyer.” She said doubt was also cast on whether it was truly Spears’ signature on the papers.
