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| In this Thursday, Oct. 18, 2018, file photo, singer Britney Spears makes
an appearance in front of the Park MGM hotel-casino in Las Vegas.
Spears wants to be freed from her father. In a recent series of court
maneuvers, Spears has sought greater say over her life and affairs,
which for years have been under the control of a court conservatorship
run mostly by her father, James Spears. (Steve Marcus/Las Vegas Sun via
AP, File) |
Policy changes and pop stars – two topics that aren’t frequently discussed together. With the growing spotlight on Britney Spear’s
contested conservatorship, that is changing. Many in our nation are
getting a first glimpse at a broken system that has ruined lives,
drained bank accounts, and destroyed families across the nation.
Don’t get me wrong;
even Britney will tell you: there’s a time and a place for the court to
examine all evidence, hear all sides and make well-informed judgments on
the appointment of a trusted and qualified conservator to protect those
who cannot protect themselves. It’s been said Britney herself has
agreed that her own conservatorship was initially needed. But her lawyer
is claiming the situation in her case and, all too often in our own
communities, the people who the court claims they are trying to protect
actually find themselves prisoners.
With Spears’ birthday
this week and recent court arguments coming to light, we can all hope
there is a tipping point coming. Not only a time for a change in Britney
Spears’ case but also a time for state and federal lawmakers to
reexamine and fix the problems that have repeatedly been acknowledged by
families, national advocates, the Bar Association, and even the Government Accountability Office.
The #FreeBritney
movement has taken hold and captured the attention of the nation and the
world, and my hope is that the same people watching the case unfold
come to see the bigger issue – that this is happening in cities and
counties in each and every one of their backyards.
Multiple petitions to
release Britney Spears from her conservatorship have gained the support
of hundreds of thousands of people. The Twitter hashtag #FreeBrittney
brings up countless tweets in many languages. With Britney’s 39th
birthday on Dec. 2, the timeline is currently flooded with warm wishes
and messages that include hopes that she will be freed from her
conservatorship.
Articles can be found in nearly every media outlet across the web. From People, Page 6, and Vanity Fair
to more traditional news outlets like CNN, ABC News, and NBC. It seems
every outlet is detailing her case. A case that began in 2008 with a
temporary order placing Britney under her father James Spears’ control
during a mental health crisis is now on year 12, with no discernable end
in sight.
As Alabama Today
reported previously in our second in this series, “The American Bar
Association published a study in 2017 on the Restoration of Rights in Adult Guardianship that
found, “an unknown number of adults languish under guardianship” when
they no longer need it, or never did. The authors wrote that
“guardianship is generally permanent, leaving no way out—‘until death do
us part.’ ”
Earlier this week NPR did a story
on conservatorships based on Britney’s case noting that a DOJ study
found that there are an estimated 1.3 million people who are involved in
conservatorship cases in the U.S. They play the tearful audio of the
only time Britney detailed her feelings on her conservatorship publicly.
She compared it to a prison sentence but said even then you know when
you’re going to get out. She went on to say it was like groundhog day.
It was widely reported
that during a November hearing, Brittney’s attorney told the court, “My
client has informed me that she is afraid of her father.” Going on to
say, “She will not perform again if her father is in charge of her
career.” ABC News Reports detail
how Britney is not only not getting a say in choices that affect her
life; her estranged father isn’t even informing her of major decisions
and changes that impact her.
It is unconscionable
that a system designed to protect the vulnerable from being victims is
making so many feel victimized and taking away their rights and their
voices.
The system hasn’t
spared us in Alabama or even Jefferson County, AL. either. We’ve had our
own share of “egregious” violations of civil rights as well as a lack
of transparency and accountability.
In the case that spurred months of investigative journalism and this series by Alabama Today, that of Joann Bashinsky (aka Mrs. B), the Alabama Supreme Court issued a scathing rebuke of Judge Alan King’s actions.
Actions that others say are commonplace in courtrooms around the state.
Emergency orders that went on for long periods of time and wards, or
would be wards, left without representation or their voices heard.
As reported in the Washington Post
the in the case before the Alabama supreme court, “Justices said
Bashinsky’s basic due-process rights were egregiously violated when the
probate court made the emergency decision without giving her time to
obtain counsel after her lawyers were disqualified. The permanent
petition remains pending before the court.
Joann Bashinsky is the widow of Sloan Y. Bashinsky, Sr.
who owned the majority stock in Golden Enterprises, Inc., and who was
the founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Golden Flake
Foods. Her personal estate is estimated to be worth $80 million, and her
entire estate was valued at $218 million.
Is the Bashinsky case unique? No. How many more are like it? We
don’t know, but we’re trying to find out. We have heard from others that
Judge King was known to put wards under the supervision of his
handpicked court-ordered conservators, even when family members were
willing and able to fulfill the role.
We don’t know how many
though. As the Government Accountability Office and other watchdog
groups have noted, data on contested conservatorship and/or guardianship
cases is mostly unknown.
I asked the Jefferson
County probate court first in a series of emails and then in an official
public record request, a series of questions about how many cases have
been processed here in the last several years. My request was first
dated June 15, 2020. As of December 7, 2020, I have no answers. The
probate office, in the first 48-hours, did provide a litany of excuses
for not providing the records. First, they stated they needed a judge’s
permission. Specifically, they said they needed Judge King’s permission,
even though he retired prior to my request. Second, the supervisor
blamed the lack of ability to produce a response on the county’s dated
computer system, even though the person at the desk told me that they
used to be able to provide the data. Finally, I was told the delay was
related to staffing shortages. The underlying cause of both the bad
system and the staffing issue was apparently due to a county
commission’s lack of funding. So what can we do? Besides following the
Britney Spears case, we can contact our local, state, and federal
lawmakers about reforming contested conservatorships and making the
system more transparent.
Alabama can adopt
recommendations from the American Bar Association that would address
this problem by making the type of information I’m requesting (the
number of conservatorship and guardianship cases assigned to
county-designated conservators public in both contested and uncontested
cases) and requiring it to be presented to the state and made publicly
available online by county.
The ABA, in a policy statement on the issue,
said among other recommendations, it “encourages the federal government
to provide funding and support for training, research, exchange of
information on practices, consistent collection of data, and development
of state, local and territorial standards regarding adult
guardianship.”
A google search for
“Britney Spears conservatorship” brings up over 2,530,000 hits. I hope
that from her story, there is additional transparency and accountability
for many who don’t have her fame, her wealth, or her legions of fans.
You can help by calling your county commissioners and state legislators
and telling them it is time to protect those who can’t protect
themselves.
This is the latest installment in an ongoing investigative series. You can earlier posts Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, and Part 4 here, Part 5 here, and Part 6 here.
