“These are entirely her words,” said Samuel D.
At the time, Ms. Spears had been hospitalized for an involuntary psychiatric evaluation amid concerns about her mental health and substance abuse, and her father, James P.
Mr. Ingham did not respond to requests to comment Thursday on how his client’s portrayal of him in court corresponded with his own view of his counsel, and it is unknown what discussions the two have had about whether or how Ms. Spears could ask to end the conservatorship.
And in her remarks, Ms. Spears noted that she and Mr. Ingham had developed a closer relationship of late, speaking about three times per week.
Wentz, a trusts and estate lawyer for Fox Rothschild, said that given what Ms. Spears presented in court, she “can’t even fathom” why Mr. Ingham had not been prompted to file to terminate the conservatorship.
A go-to veteran of the California probate system, Mr. Ingham has been selected to work on other complex conservatorship cases, including those of the radio personality Casey Kasem and the media mogul Sumner Redstone, both of whom were old and ailing.
For his work with Ms. Spears, Mr. Ingham is paid $475 an hour — a special rate allowed by the court in cases that feature “unusual problems requiring extraordinary expertise.” In 2019, the last year in which full accounting was available, Mr. Ingham made about $373,000 for his work with Ms. Spears, bringing his total since 2008 to near $3 million.
According to the court records, Mr. Ingham noted that Ms. Spears had been “hostile, aggressive, and extremely threatening toward the conservatorship,” especially in the presence of her boyfriend at the time, David Lucado.
Recently, Mr. Ingham brought on additional lawyers to help with Ms. Spears’s case.
How we treated her was disgusting.” ”Britney had to navigate being told who she could be and what she could do.” ”People became fascinated with her sort of unraveling.” ”She accepted the conservatorship was going to happen, but she didn‘t want her father to be her conservator.