Britney Spears made a court appearance on Friday in Los Angeles to attend a new status hearing on her conservatorship.
Britney Spears made a court appearance on Friday in Los Angeles to attend a new status hearing on her conservatorship.
The singer entered the courtroom with her mother, Lynne Spears, at around 2 p.m. Earlier on Friday, her attorney asked the court that the status hearing on her conservatorship be closed to the public because of the private nature of information that will be discussed. The judge granted the request.
A source tells ET that Britney sat next to Lynne inside the courtroom, and looked "comfortable." Britney and Lynne left the courthouse at around 3 p.m.
According to court documents obtained by ET, the judge in Friday’s status hearing appointed an expert to evaluate the conservatorship. This is an unbiased, independent expert. The next status hearing has been set for Sept. 18.
ET also learned on Friday that an expert will most likely conduct a mental evaluation on Britney at some point between now and the next hearing. According to the judge, Britney’s father, Jamie Spears, and a court appointed attorney will set the parameters of the evaluation. Additionally, ET learned that Britney asked the judge to allow her specific freedoms that she does not have access to because of her conservatorship, but we're told the judge did not grant any of the singer's requests.
A judge set the status hearing date back in April, and since then, there have been new developments. On Monday, Britney's mother, Lynne requested special notice of all matters relating to Britney's conservatorship. Lynne has not previously played any role in her eldest daughter's conservatorship. Britney's father has been the 37-year-old singer's conservator since 2008, and he became her sole conservator this year after his former co-conservator, attorney Andrew Wallet, resigned in March.
ET reported that Britney completed treatment at a health facility late last month, a little over three weeks after she checked herself in. A source previously told ET that the singer checked herself into the facility after being under tremendous stress over her father suffering a health crisis.
As for how she's doing now, a source tells ET that Britney currently has good days and bad days, and will for a while. Another source previously told ET that she's being supported by her longtime boyfriend, Sam Asghari, and is going on outings that she enjoys.
"Britney wants privacy, but knows she needs to do what's best for her treatment," the source said. "[Her previous] frozen yogurt outing in Santa Monica was planned because the doctors and those closest to her are trying to encourage her to do some routine things she enjoys in order to help her get balanced and back to normal life again."
"This has been an incredibly rough road, but she knows it will all be worth it," the source added at the time.
Britney has certainly been going through a lot the past few days. On top of recently being released from treatment, she was granted a restraining order against her ex-manager, Sam Lutfi, on Wednesday. In documents obtained by ET, she alleges that Lutfi has been harassing her and her mother since she completed treatment. The singer claims that Lutfi has been texting harassing messages to her and her family, while posting disparaging and disruptive comments on social media. Britney's attorneys also allege that Lutfi has attempted to impact the singer's conservatorship by taking to social media to make calls for "vigilante action," as well as "offering bribes and threatening the release of private information."
Lutfi then filed in opposition. According to the documents obtained by ET, he claimed he had not directly contacted Britney since at least 2009 and the only evidence the conservatorship has is a "brief and non-confrontational text message with Lynne Spears" and tweet replies. He also claimed that his actions "could not have caused a reasonable person to suffer the requisite substantial emotional distress" needed for a restraining order.
ET recently spoke with Cardi B, who shared a heartfelt message of support for Britney after Britney shared Instagram videos of herself working out to the rapper's hit, "I Like It."
"I love you and I totally understand," Cardi said to Britney. "Fame will really drive you insane. Not only will fame drive you insane, but it's like, once you have money, and everybody just wants to take it from you, or sometimes you just have, like, your own personal problems."
"When you're a celebrity, everyone wants to sue you, everyone wants a piece of the money that you work for -- and it's very frustrating," she continued. "Then you have, like, the whole world looking at you, no privacy, it's crazy. I can't imagine if you do it for such a long time like her."
Watch the video below for more:
-- Reporting by Brendon Geoffrion
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