LOS ANGELES – Britney Spears was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs near her Southern California home and released, authorities said. A statement from Spears’ representative calls the arrest “inexcusable.”
The California Highway Patrol (CHP) said officers received a report shortly before 9pm (5am Singapore time) on Wednesday (March 4) that someone in a black BMW 430i was driving fast and erratically on US 101 in Newbury Park, California in Ventura County near the Los Angeles County line.
The 44-year-old pop star, the only person in the car, exited the freeway and pulled over, a CHP statement said. She appeared to be impaired, took a series of field sobriety tests, was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence of a combination of alcohol and drugs and was taken to a Ventura County jail, the CHP said. Chemical test results are pending and the case remains under investigation.
Spears was booked early Thursday morning and released at about 6am, according to jail records.
“This was an unfortunate incident that is completely inexcusable,” a statement from a Spears representative said. “Britney is going to take the right steps and comply with the law and hopefully this can be the first step in long overdue change that needs to occur in Britney’s life. Hopefully, she can get the help and support she needs during this difficult time.”
The Ventura County District Attorney’s Office will determine whether charges will be filed. Spears has a May 4 court date scheduled.
The arrest was a few miles from Thousand Oaks, California where Spears has a home. The CHP listed her as living in nearby Westlake Village.
Born in Mississippi and raised in Louisiana, Spears was a teen pop phenomenon who became a defining superstar of the ’90s and 2000s. She rose to fame from Disney Channel’s The Mickey Mouse Club to MTV and beyond, with such era-defining hits like Baby One More Time, Oops! I Did It Again, and Toxic.
Most of her albums have been certified platinum, according to the Recording Industry Association of America, with two diamond titles: 1999’s Baby One More Time and 2000s Oops! I Did It Again. Her last full-length album, Glory, was released in 2016.
Spears became a focus of tabloids in the early 2000s, and a source of public scrutiny, as she battled mental illness and paparazzi documented the details of her private life.
Later, as cultural opinion evolved to recognise the misogynistic media coverage of the time, Spears’ fight to control her life became the focus of the #FreeBritney movement.
In 2008, Spears was placed under a court-ordered conservatorship, run primarily by her father and his lawyers, that would control her personal and financial decisions for well over a decade. It was dissolved in 2021. Two years later, she released a bestselling, tell-all memoir, The Woman In Me.
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