DOWNLOAD LETTER AS PDF
July 6, 2021
The State Bar of California
180 Howard St.
San Francisco, CA 94105
845 S. Figueroa St.
Los Angeles, CA 90017
Re: Attorney Misconduct Complaint Against Attorney Samuel D. Ingham III
We are the #FreeBritney movement, which is dedicated to the safety and well-being of Britney Jean Spears (“Ms. Spears”), the person. Our movement also advocates against all conservatorship/guardianship abuse.
We are a collective of advocates including (but not limited to): accountants; lawyers; journalists; and other professionals. We are comprised of not only advocates from the State of California and other states in the United States of America, but also from a multitude of other jurisdictions around the globe.
We recognize that the laws of the State of California - and those of the United States of America - have been (and continue to be) of immense influence to the legal world. For that reason, it is of critical importance that justice be done and be seen to be done for Ms. Spears, as her high-profile case can change the lives of millions of Americans – and countless others around the world – that are subjected to potentially abusive conservatorships/guardianships.
Ms. Spears has been under conservatorships of the person and estate (together the “Conservatorship”) since 2008. California attorney Samuel D. Ingham III (“Mr. Ingham”) has been acting as Ms. Spears’s court-appointed counsel since 2008.
The Conservatorship was placed on Ms. Spears in 2008 due to her alleged “incapacity” to look after herself and her finances. However, given Ms. Spears’s astounding personal and professional accomplishments over the past thirteen (13) years, it is very difficult to believe that a conservatorship is — or ever was — necessary. Such a process is meant to be used as an absolute last resort.
Among her many achievements since 2008, Ms. Spears has managed to: record four (4) studio albums; learn intricate choreography routines to perform on stage in front of hundreds of thousands of people in four (4) world tours and a four (4) year Las Vegas residency; record fifteen (15) music videos; participate in numerous television and radio interviews; record various documentaries and commercials; form romantic relationships; participate in the raising of her two (2) children; and even mentor other children in the reality competition television show, “The X Factor.”
As you are aware, on or about May 10, 2021 various activists in the #FreeBritney movement filed attorney misconduct complaints against Mr. Ingham through you, the State Bar of California (the “Bar”).
Today, you will be receiving several new complaints of attorney misconduct (and requests to launch investigations) in relation to Mr. Ingham’s actions and omissions as court-appointed counsel for Ms. Spears. Our new complaints will rely on the facts and documentation previously submitted to you on May 10, as well as on new evidence that has since come to light (as detailed below).
THE #FREEBRITNEY MOVEMENT’S PRIOR BAR COMPLAINTS FILED ON MAY 10, 2021
In our prior complaints, we had highlighted how the facts and evidence presented to you led us to reasonably believe that Mr. Ingham has either contravened the law, and/or the Rules of Professional Conduct due to his:
complicity or negligence in the unlawful, or otherwise improper, continuance of the suspicious Conservatorship over Ms. Spears;
breach of duties owed to Ms. Spears by either failing to reasonably advise of her right to petition to terminate the Conservatorship, or by failing to abide by her wishes;
conflict of interest and undue influence in relation to Ms. Spears.
As noted in our original complaints, Mr. Ingham’s role in this suspicious — if not fraudulent — Conservatorship gave us reasonable cause for concern, particularly based on the following non-exhaustive list of facts (all relevant sources have been hyperlinked):
(a.) Firstly, according to media reports, after a brief interview of about fifteen (15) minutes with Ms. Spears on or about February 3, 2008, Mr. Ingham determined that she “did not understand” the nature of the [Conservatorship] proceedings, nor the impact the process could have on her affairs. During that short interview, he apparently also had sufficient time to conclude that Ms. Spears “lacks the capacity to retain direct counsel.” He then submitted these allegations to the Court, which was presided by Commissioner Reva Goetz.
According to a February 4, 2008 order, the Court expressly relied on Mr. Ingham’s allegations and on the declarations of J. Edward Spar, M.D. Thus, on February 4, 2008, Commissioner Goetz found that Ms. Spears “does not have the capacity” to retain counsel. As such, attorney Adam Streisand was excluded from the proceedings, despite appearing to be Ms. Spears’s choice of counsel. That order also confirmed Mr. Ingham’s ongoing role as Probate Volunteer Panel (PVP) counsel for Ms. Spears, since his appointment on February 1, 2008.
Per relevant court Minutes, as Ms. Spears’s PVP attorney, he had also used that opportunity to “waive” Ms. Spears’s appearance during such important proceedings and accepted the service of relevant documentation on her behalf. Letters of Temporary Conservatorship were also extended on that date.
(b.) Secondly, pursuant to relevant filings by Ms. Spears’s conservators, there was a coordinated effort to prevent Ms. Spears from receiving proper legal notice of the Conservatorship proceedings as otherwise required by Cal. Prob. Code Section 2250. Ms. Spears was in an involuntary Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code Section 5150 hold at the time.
However, it does not seem that Mr. Ingham ever objected to that effort. As mentioned above, he even went so far as to waive her appearances at vital proceedings.
(c.) Thirdly, according to attorney Jon Eardley’s filing in federal court:
“[Ms. Spears’s] rights have been significantly violated because without the right to notice and a hearing, many, if not all, of Britney’s other rights under the constitution have been deprived, including the right to freedom of association under the First Amendment; the right to due process under the Fifth Amendment; the right to counsel of her own choosing and the right to meet with counsel in private under the Sixth Amendment; the right to a jury trial under the Seventh Amendment; and the right to a fair trial where she is afforded equal protection of the law under the Fourteenth Amendment. Such a significant deprivation of rights cannot be cavalierly disregarded in the name of obtaining an extraordinarily restrictive conservatorship.”
Mr. Eardley was another attorney that Ms. Spears appeared to have chosen to assist her in fighting this Conservatorship. However, this choice of counsel seems to have also been denied to her.
(d.) Fourthly, Mr. Ingham seemingly failed to ever object or challenge the serious allegations from one (1) or more of her co-conservators that Ms. Spears had a degenerative condition “related to dementia” as per relevant court filings. Ms. Spears was twenty-six (26) years old at the time.
Such allegations were in fact proven false just a few weeks after Ms. Spears was deemed “incapacitated.” On or about March 24, 2008, the television show “How I Met Your Mother” aired an episode guest-starring Ms. Spears. Ms. Spears was apparently capable enough to memorize lines for this acting role, despite the allegations and findings as to her condition and capacity.
Within a few weeks of Ms. Spears’s guest-starring role, she was confirmed to be recording a new studio album. Just a few months after that, she embarked on a grueling world tour.
(e.) Fifthly, Mr. Ingham has submitted that Ms. Spears lacks the capacity to file declarations thereby effectively silencing her and positioning him as her only voice in these proceedings.
(f.) Further, pursuant to relevant court filings and orders, since 2008 Mr. Ingham has been receiving weekly payments for his services from Ms. Spears’s estate of amounts not exceeding $10,000.00. Per recent court filings, he has recently requested payment of nearly $900,000 from Ms. Spears’s estate for 29 months of services in his capacity as her court-appointed counsel.
(g.) The Los Angeles County Superior Court of California has confirmed that “a capacity declaration has not been filed in this case”.
These facts — coupled with the capabilities that Ms. Spears has shown during the Conservatorship’s existence — led us to question whether Mr. Ingham had been complicit in its unlawful, or otherwise improper, continuance.
We had also conveyed to you that it was reasonably evident that in the past thirteen (13) years Mr. Ingham repeatedly failed his ethical duties to abide by his client’s wishes and represent her best interests. After all, in the 2008 documentary “Britney: For the Record,” Ms. Spears not only publicly expressed her wishes to be freed from the Conservatorship, but she also confirmed that she was not being heard by anyone. In a 2020 interview with “As NOT Seen on TV,” Ms. Spears’s brother, Bryan Spears, confirmed that “she’s always wanted to get out of” the Conservatorship.
In submissions to the Court, Mr. Ingham had even confirmed that Ms. Spears is “afraid” of her father (who has served as her conservator of estate and person during the entire Conservatorship, or at least the vast majority of it).
Nonetheless, instead of promptly seeking to remove Ms. Spears from the Conservatorship — which she does not want and which has caused her fear (and potentially even harmed her) — Mr. Ingham spent the past two (2) years charging her estate to investigate her father’s management of finances. Those proceedings were still in the very early stages and a final determination of those issues was likely several years away.
As such, we concluded that Mr. Ingham had either failed to reasonably advise Ms. Spears of her rights to petition to terminate this conservatorship, or he failed to follow her wishes. Either way, Mr. Ingham was likely in breach of Rule 1.2 of the State Bar of California’s Rules of Professional Conduct (“a lawyer shall abide by a client’s decisions concerning the objectives of representation”).
Probate Code Section. 1470(a) also requires that court-appointed lawyers “protect the person’s interests.” A person as clearly capable as Ms. Spears could not possibly have her interests met by any conservatorship (a process that has made her fearful and unhappy).
We also advised you that the Court refers to the Conservatorship as “voluntary”. However, the facts and documents strongly suggest that it is anything but “voluntary”. In the absolute best case scenario, Ms. Spears only agreed to the Conservatorship under significant duress and/or undue influence. The record strongly suggests Mr. Ingham either participated in this unlawful setup, or at minimum allowed it to happen in direct violation of his ethical duties to Ms. Spears.
Given all of Mr. Ingham’s apparent failures, we also expressed concern to you that there may be a conflict of interest in his continuing representation of Ms. Spears. We believed there to be a distinct probability that he may be looking to protect himself, rather than focusing solely on Ms. Spears’s best interests. Such a conflict of interest would put Mr. Ingham in breach of Rule 1.7.
As such, we also informed you that we were troubled by the strong likelihood that Ms. Spears may be in a position where she is being unduly influenced by Mr. Ingham.
YOUR RESPONSES TO THE #FREEBRITNEY MOVEMENT’S MAY 10 COMPLAINTS
Despite the abundance of facts and documents presented in our complaints filed on or about May 10, 2021, you advised that you would not be investigating Mr. Ingham.
In several of your responses you noted that such facts would not be grounds for disciplinary action against Mr. Ingham, particularly as we were complaining about the performance of duties owed to his client and not to us.
Respectfully, that seems to be little more than an excuse to ignore our complaints, and is in fact inaccurate as demonstrated by your own website instructions for filing complaints against attorneys. Hyperlinked for your reference are the aforementioned instructions (though they had already been attached to our original complaints).
Your website clearly states: “The State Bar’s Office of Chief Trial Counsel handles complaints about unethical attorney conduct from several different sources, including clients, family and friends of clients, courts, opposing counsel, members of the public or other third parties, and anonymous submissions” [emphasis added].
Therefore, it can be reasonably understood that you expressly allow the public and third parties to make complaints against California attorneys, even if they are not subject to any duties by that attorney. Otherwise, your inclusion of “public and third parties” in these instructions would be wholly redundant given the prior reference to “clients”. Further, you even allow for “anonymous submissions”, which would prevent you from verifying a complainant’s relationship with the attorney prior to your investigation anyway.
In addition, on your website you state that: “The State Bar of California’s mission is to protect the public and includes the primary functions of licensing, regulation and discipline of attorneys; the advancement of the ethical and competent practice of law; and support of efforts for greater access to, and inclusion in, the legal system”.
The reality is that certain “clients” (such as conservatees) are often unable to file attorney complaints themselves as they can be (and often are) easily and effectively silenced by attorneys, judges, opposing counsel family, and other parties and/or interested parties in their case. Therefore, any requirement that complainants be “clients” of the attorney could even raise issues of discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
It is clear then that the public’s involvement is particularly vital when dealing with legally vulnerable “clients” such as conservatees. To deprive the public of the right to file complaints against California attorneys would directly counter your express mission of “[p]rotecting the public & enhancing the administration of justice”.
In several responses to our complaints you also made vague references as to your inability to further investigate Mr. Ingham by reason of attorney/client confidentiality, and seemingly on account of the fact that the court appointed him as Ms. Spears’s counsel. You then advised that if we had new facts and circumstances that we could submit a written statement with the new information to the Intake Unit for your review.
NEW EVIDENCE SINCE THE ORIGINAL MAY 10 COMPLAINTS
As you are likely aware, on June 23, 2021 Ms. Spears made several statements in relation to the Conservatorship to the Court, which was presided by Judge Brenda Penny. Hyperlinked is a full transcript of Ms. Spears’s statements as reported in the media.
Ms. Spears’s statements expressly confirmed all (or at least the vast majority) of the reasonable conclusions about Mr. Ingham’s representation in our May 10 complaints.
Of note, Ms. Spears made the following declarations (among many others):
“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”.
“Three days later, after I said no to Vegas, my therapist sat me down in a room and said he had a million phone calls about how I was not cooperating in rehearsals, and I haven’t been taking my medication. All this was false. He immediately, the next day, put me on lithium out of nowhere. He took me off my normal meds I’ve been on for five years. And lithium is a very, very strong and completely different medication compared to what I was used to. You can go mentally impaired if you take too much, if you stay on it longer than five months. But he put me on that and I felt drunk. I really couldn’t even take up for myself. I couldn’t even have a conversation with my mom or dad really about anything”.
“The control [my father] had over someone as powerful as me — he loved the control to hurt his own daughter 100,000%. He loved it. I packed my bags and went to [the rehab program]. I worked seven days a week, no days off, which in California, the only similar thing to this is called sex trafficking. Making anyone work against their will, taking all their possessions away — credit card, cash, phone, passport — and placing them in a home where they work with the people who live with them. They all lived in the house with me, the nurses, the 24-7 security. There was one chef that came there and cooked for me daily during the weekdays. They watched me change every day — naked – morning, noon and night. My body – I had no privacy door for my room. I gave eight vials (?) of blood a week”.
“Ma’am, my dad and anyone involved in this conservatorship and my management who played a huge role in punishing me when I said no — ma’am, they should be in jail”.
“I’ve been in shock. I am traumatized. You know, fake it till you make it. But now I’m telling you the truth, OK? I’m not happy. I can’t sleep. I’m so angry it’s insane. And I’m depressed. I cry every day”.
“When I do everything I’m told and the state of California allowed my father — ignorant father — to take his own daughter, who only has a role with me if I work with him, they’ve set back the whole course and allowed him to do that to me. That’s given these people I’ve worked for way too much control. They also threaten me and said, If I don’t go, then I have to go to court. And it will be more embarrassing to me if the judge publicly makes the evidence we have”.
“The last time I spoke to you [Judge Brenda Penny] by just keeping the conservatorship going, and also keeping my dad in the loop, made me feel like I was dead — like I didn’t matter, like nothing had been done to me, like you thought I was lying or something. I’m telling you again, because I’m not lying. I want to feel heard. And I’m telling you this again, so maybe you can understand the depth and the degree and the damage that they did to me back then”.
“Ma’am, I didn’t know I could petition the conservatorship to end it. I’m sorry for my ignorance, but I honestly didn’t know that”.
“Again, it makes no sense whatsoever for the state of California to sit back and literally watch me with their own two eyes, make a living for so many people, and pay so many people, trucks and buses on the road with me and be told, I’m not good enough”.
“I also would like to be able to share my story with the world, and what they did to me, instead of it being a hush-hush secret to benefit all of them. I want to be able to be heard on what they did to me by making me keep this in for so long, it is not good for my heart. I’ve been so angry and I cry every day. It concerns me, I’m told I’m not allowed to expose the people who did this to me”.
“For my sanity, I need you to the judge to approve me to do an interview where I can be heard on what they did to me. And actually, I have the right to use my voice and take up for myself. My attorney says I can’t. It’s not good. I can’t let the public know anything they did to me and by not saying anything, is saying it’s OK. It’s not OK. Actually, I don’t want an interview — I’d much rather just have an open call to you for the press to hear, which I didn’t know today we’re doing, so thank you”.
“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”.
“The main reason why I’m here is because I want to end the conservatorship without having to be evaluated”.
“I have trapped phobias being in small rooms because of the trauma, locking me up for four months in that place. It’s not okay for them to send me — sorry, I’m going fast — to that small room like that twice a week with another new therapist that I pay that I never even approved. I don’t like it. I don’t want to do that. And I haven’t done anything wrong to deserve this treatment”.
“The conservatorship, from the beginning, once you see someone, whoever it is, in the conservatorship making money, making them money, and myself money and working – that whole statement right there, the conservatorship should end. I shouldn’t be in a conservatorship if I can work and provide money and work for myself and pay other people — it makes no sense. The laws need to change. What state allows people to own another person’s money and account and threaten them and saying, “You can’t spend your money unless you do what we want you to do.” And I’m paying them”.
“I truly believe this conservatorship is abusive, and that we can sit here all day and say oh, conservatorships are here to help people. But ma’am, there is a thousand conservatorships that are abusive as well”.
“And I’m not able to see my friends that live eight minutes away from me, which I find extremely strange”.
“I was told right now in the conservatorship, I’m not able to get married or have a baby, I have a (IUD) inside of myself right now so I don’t get pregnant. I wanted to take the (IUD) out so I could start trying to have another baby. But this so-called team won’t let me go to the doctor to take it out because they don’t want me to have children – any more children. So basically, this conservatorship is doing me waaay more harm than good”.
“But I wish I could stay with you on the phone forever, because when I get off the phone with you, all of a sudden all I hear all these no’s — no, no, no. And then all of a sudden I get I feel ganged up on and I feel bullied and I feel left out and alone. And I’m tired of feeling alone. I deserve to have the same rights as anybody does, by having a child, a family, any of those things, and more so”. [emphasis added]
On July 3, 2021, journalists Ronan Farrow and Jia Tolentino published an investigative article with The New Yorker, which dove into many abuses committed against Ms. Spears in this Conservatorship.
Some excerpts in the article pertaining to Mr. Ingham are as follows:
“A conservatorship was granted without ever talking to [Ms. Spears],” she said. “And, whatever they claim about any input she had behind the scenes, how could you have assessed her then? Shouldn’t you wait a week, then interview her? She never had a chance.”
“Ingham remains in the role; Spears covers his annual salary of five hundred and twenty thousand dollars. (Her own living expenses in 2019 were $438,360.)”
“The lawyers noted that Spears did have the right to meet with legal counsel: Sam Ingham, who met with Spears for about fifteen minutes two days after the conservatorship was granted, when he visited her at the U.C.L.A. hospital. Several sources close to the situation felt that Ingham was loyal to the conservatorship and to Jamie, despite nominally representing Spears. Butcher recalled Jamie saying that Ingham reported to him on Spears’s movements and activities. (Ingham did not respond to repeated requests for comment for this story.)”
“She had been asking Gallery to help her find another lawyer.”
“The Times has reported that Ingham described a ninety-minute meeting with Spears as ‘at least three times longer’ than any session he’d previously had with her. In one hearing, according to the Times, Goetz, the judge, told him that she didn’t recall an order specifically preventing Spears from getting married, but that he ‘may not want to tell her that.” Ingham replied, “Somehow, that did not come up in the conversation.’”
The statements put forward by Ms. Spears and in these reports should very much concern you:
Ms. Spears corroborated that in these 13 years of her Conservatorship, until just recently, she was never made aware of her right to petition to terminate the Conservatorship. As stated in our complaints, given that Ms. Spears was able to work on scripted television just weeks after being placed in the Conservatorship this right should have been one of the first matters that Mr. Ingham raised with his client. Such a failure by an experienced and very well-compensated probate attorney is inexcusable, and likely arises to the level of gross negligence.
This is a gross violation of Rule 1.4 under “Communication with Clients”, which states that a lawyer shall “reasonably consult with the client about the means by which to accomplish the client’s objectives in the representation.”
Further, according to Rule 1.3, an attorney “shall not intentionally, repeatedly, recklessly, or with gross negligence fail to act with reasonable diligence in representing a client”. “[R]easonable diligence” is defined further in that rule as “commitment and dedication to the interests of the client and does not neglect or disregard, or unduly delay a legal matter entrusted to the lawyer.”
As a court investigator involved in Ms. Spears’s case recently divulged to the New York Times, Mr. Ingham has been well aware for at least several years of Ms. Spears’s wishes to end the Conservatorship, and of much of the mistreatment and oppression that she has endured,
In recent court statements, Ms. Spears also confirmed that Mr. Ingham even advised her against speaking out about the abuses that she suffered under this Conservatorship. In at least one instance, Mr. Ingham dissuaded his client by telling her that she could be sued.
Not only is Mr. Ingham’s statement to Ms. Spears false as she cannot be personally liable given her status as a probate conservatee, but it can be reasonably concluded that he has unduly influenced his client into remaining silent as, after all, the abuses happened under his watch (or worse, with his consent).
Mr. Ingham himself wrote in the 2021 edition of CEB’s California Conservatorship Practice (the leading practice guide for California probate attorneys): “Representation by a competent attorney offers many benefits both to the client and to the process itself.”
Mr. Ingham is clearly aware of the importance of competent and diligent counsel for clients (such as conservatees) who are not permitted to choose their own counsel. However, he has deliberately or negligently failed to abide by his legal duties.
Ms. Spears confirmed that her conservators have directly or indirectly caused her to be: subjected to reproductive coercion; institutionalized and drugged against her will; trafficked; threatened; silenced; traumatized; and isolated, among many other abuses. Mr. Ingham allowed medical decisions to be made against Ms. Spears’s will despite the absence of any capacity declaration or other evidence that establishes a lack of capacity to make medical decisions.
The fact that Mr. Ingham has permitted his client to remain trapped as a conservatee, all while she is able to work full-time and make money for everybody involved in this Conservatorship under grueling industry schedules, and even allowed her to be robbed of her reproductive rights against her will (among other abuses)…is ABHORRENT and INHUMANE.
CONCLUSION
There is a clear pattern of inaction by Mr. Ingham to the exploitation of his client in this Conservatorship. Mr. Ingham has done little more than maintain the status quo for almost a decade and a half at the expense of his client’s rights, best interests, dignity and well-being.
To this day, Mr. Ingham has yet to file a petition to terminate the Conservatorship and step down as counsel despite the fact that on June 23, 2021 the entire world heard Ms. Spears demand such a filing and demanded the right to choose counsel other than Mr. Ingham.
Contrary to the suggestions in your responses to our May 10 complaints, the fact that Mr. Ingham was appointed by the court to represent Ms. Spears does not in any way exclude him from scrutiny. In fact, given Ms. Spears’s legal vulnerability as a conservatee, Mr. Ingham’s duty to reasonably and zealously represent and defend her is even more necessary.
In addition to new counsel and the immediate termination of the Conservatorship without further prodding of her body and character, Ms. Spears has also clearly expressed her wishes for more transparency and scrutiny into her case. Given all of the abuses swept under the rug in this case, these requests are more than justified.
Thus, in the context of these facts and evidence it is your obligation to immediately investigate Mr. Ingham’s actions and omissions as Ms. Spears’s court-appointed attorney. You must also without delay take all reasonable steps to help protect Ms. Spears from further harm by or on account of the actions or omissions of any other persons or bodies, including (but not limited to): Mr. Ingham; her conservators; her family; any lawyers; any medical practitioners; any judges; and any courts or other bodies of the State of California.
This duty has been confirmed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation as several #FreeBritney activists have been advised by this agency that local state bar associations are primarily responsible for such matters.
The apparent violations of rights suffered by Ms. Spears are not an isolated incident, but rather an endemic and ever-growing problem in conservatorships all around California. As such, these issues require the Bar’s immediate attention. Your involvement in this case is now required as a matter of public policy, and would not unreasonably interfere with attorney/client confidentiality any more than it does in other complaints that you are compelled to investigate.
Ms. Spears lambasted the State of California for allowing such abuses to occur and continue, and you are an integral part of the legal system that has created and allowed these abuses to flourish.
Your urgent attention is required. You cannot continue to ignore or delay the protection of residents of the State of California from your own members, especially given your shameful history of turning a blind eye to abuse, with attorney Thomas Girardi serving as the latest high-profile example.
We look forward to your thorough and meticulous investigation. We will not be giving up.
Sincerely,
The #FreeBritney Movement