Britney Spears‘ court-appointed lawyer Samuel D. Ingham III has reportedly filed paperwork to resign from his role.
The news, reported by Deadline and TMZ, comes less than 24 hours after Spears’ longtime manager Larry Rudolph’s own resignation upon learning the singer is considering officially retiring.
Ingham was first appointed as Spears’ lawyer in 2008 by Reva G. Goetz, a former judge in the conservatorship case, and represented her for the following 13 years. Per Los Angeles Superior Court documents published by Deadline, filings state “SAMUEL D. INGHAM III hereby resigns as court-appointed counsel for BRITNEY JEAN SPEARS, conservatee, effective upon the appointment of new court-appointed counsel”.
The same documents indicate the simultaneous withdrawal of law firm Loeb and Loeb from the Spears conservatorship case.
As the publication notes, the withdrawals must be approved by Judge Brenda Penny who has presided over the case in recent years.
Last month (June 23), Spears addressed a Los Angeles court in an open hearing, calling for an end to her 11-year conservatorship under her father, which she deemed as abusive and controlling. She alleged that she is forbidden from having more children, getting married or taking out her IUD.
Following the testimony, a judge denied a “months old” request from her attorney to have Jamie removed.
In an investigative report by The New Yorker, published on Sunday (July 4), it was revealed Spears had phoned 911 on the eve of her testimony. Her team had been “texting one another frantically… worried about what Spears might say the next day, and they discussed how to prepare in the event that she went rogue”.
It was also revealed, according to former family friend Jacqueline Butcher, that the process to establish the conservatorship took “maybe 10 minutes”.
“No one testified,” she said. “No questions were asked.”