Archive for January, 2008

Britney spotted buying a pregnancy test?

Thursday, January 17th, 2008

Is baby No. 3 on the way for Britney Spears?

The 26-year-old was captured checking out a pregnancy test at Rite-Aid on Monday afternoon, leaving many to wonder if the embattled singer is with boy toy Adnan Ghalib’s child.

The duo shopped for the test at the pharmacy following the pop star’s (dis) appearance at court on Monday, where they also filled out a prescription.

**Exclusive** Britney Spears and Adnan Ghalib
(finalpixx.com)

As reported in the newest issue of OK!, Brit is longing for a so-called replacement baby to fill the void left by sons Sean Preston, 2, and Jayden James, 1, after losing custody of them to ex-husband Kevin Federline.

“Britney hates when things are taken from her,” a family member of Kevin’s tells OK!. “The court’s taken Preston and Jayden away, so she’ll just have another kid to take their place. That’s the way she thinks.”

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The Internet Is Making It Hard To Be A Gangster

Wednesday, January 16th, 2008

One of the Sicilian Mafia’s oldest and most steady revenue streams, protection money, called “pizzo” in Italian, is now at risk a new website that now provides extorted businessmen the support with which to stand up to the mob. Traditionally considered a death sentence to stand up to the Sicilian Mafia, Addiopizzo.org, which means “Goodbye Pizzo,” voluntarily lists 230 businesses who openly defy the payment to the Mafia. There is safety in numbers, and the tide of pizzo payments is indeed starting to turn. Perhaps what the website organizers should offer next is the ability for the pizzo-paying business owners to list what they are each paying for “protection.” That way, perhaps they can lend some transparency to the Mafia’s business. After all, why pay 500 euros a month if your neighbor is only paying 100 euros a month for his “I-hope-nothing-bad-happens-to-you” policy? Or, perhaps, once again, the web has brought an end to an outdated business model, and the Sicilian Mafia needs to adapt with the times. From spam to porn to gambling, the Internet is rife with shady schemes in which the well-organized gangster can participate.

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Names in national steroids investigation include 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Timbaland and Wyclef Jean

Monday, January 14th, 2008

The names of R&B music star Mary J. Blige, along with rap artists 50 Cent, Timbaland and Wyclef Jean, and award-winning author and producer Tyler Perry, have emerged in an Albany-based investigation of steroids trafficking that has already rocked the professional sports world, according to confidential sources. Information has surfaced recently showing those stars are among tens of thousands of people who may have used or received prescribed shipments of steroids and injectable human growth hormone in recent years. Law enforcement officials have said they have no evidence in their sprawling multistate probe that customers, including Blige or other entertainers, violated any laws. Instead, they are targeting anti-aging clinics, doctors and pharmacists who prescribed the drugs.

Still, medical experts say that use of steroids and human growth hormone — an estimated $10 billion-a-year operation worldwide — reaching into the entertainment industry illustrates how pervasive steroids use in the United States has become. It is not unique to athletics, where performance-enhancing drug use has marred many sports. For many celebrities, the lure of hormonal drugs is their supposed, unproven anti-aging effects.

While Congress is preparing to focus on baseball players alleged to have taken the drugs, medical experts are warning that steroids and human growth hormone are being illegally prescribed nationwide at an alarming rate under the misconception they will aid healing, enhance looks, strength and speed, or slow aging.

Records shared with the Times Union and information from several cooperating witnesses on Long Island indicate Blige and other stars were shipped prescribed human growth hormone or steroids — sometimes under fictitious names — at hotels, production studios, private residences, an upscale Manhattan fitness club and through the Long Island office of Michael Diamond, a chiropractor affiliated with the celebrities, sources said.

Diamond, who has not been identified as a target in the case or accused of breaking any laws, helps run an anti-aging program at Clay Gym in Manhattan, according to the company’s Web site.

The Albany investigation became a nationwide spectacle last February when authorities raided a Palm Beach County wellness center and the offices of Signature Compounding Pharmacy in downtown Orlando. The wellness center’s owners and the pharmacy’s operators are awaiting trial in Albany on charges related to the sale of millions of dollars worth of prescription drugs, mostly steroids, through a suspected criminal enterprise involving allegedly corrupt physicians and a series of anti-aging “clinics” that advertised predominantly through the Internet.

In the past year the case has netted 10 guilty pleas, including felony convictions of three physicians and several operators of anti-aging clinics in Texas, Florida and New York.

Along the way it has exposed allegations of steroid use by Major League Baseball players, pro wrestlers, NFL figures, police officers, prison guards, top-ranked body builders, people with ties to high school and college wrestling programs, and now, celebrities.

In a brief interview at his Patchtogue office Friday, Diamond said patient privacy laws prohibit him from discussing the stars he has treated or why.

“I don’t have anything to do with athletes, I don’t do athletes,” Diamond said. “Anyone that wants to publicly state that they work with me can do so, it’s just I’m not allowed legally to state who I treat or who I don’t treat.”

Still, it appears evident Diamond caters to famous clients as evidenced by the many stars, including Steven Seagal, whose photographs — some autographed to Diamond — adorn his office’s walls.

“Because of this recent development as far as what I found out was going on with (Signature) pharmacy I was approached and I was … told not to discuss anything right now … because there’s investigations going on,” Diamond said, not elaborating.

Diamond said he had previously met officials from Signature pharmacy at anti-aging conventions, but that he learned of the year-old criminal case only recently.

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Christina Aguilera is a new mommy to a baby boy

Monday, January 14th, 2008

Christina Aguilera has given birth to a boy, the pop singer announced on her Web site Sunday.

Christina Aguilera preggers “Christina Aguilera and Jordan Bratman are proud to announce the birth of their son Max Liron Bratman,” the brief message said. “He is a beautiful, healthy baby boy.”

The baby was born Saturday night and weighs 6 pounds, 2 ounces. Aguilera, 27, was “resting and doing well,” according to the message on her Web site, http://www.christinaaguilera.com/.

Aguilera said that Saturday was “a very joyful and special day for Jordan and I.”

There was no immediate response Sunday to several calls seeking additional comment from Aguilera’s representatives.

Aguilera and Bratman married in 2005. The four-time Grammy Award winning singer has said she learned she was pregnant during her recent “Back to Basics” tour.

Source: Yahoo! 

Hannah Montana caught using body double

Saturday, January 12th, 2008

The body double was only on stage for a few seconds, and the switcheroo was relatively innocuous. But since it involved the “Hannah Montana” show — the sold-out tour for which tickets have been scalped for hundreds of dollars — even the use of a brief stand-in for its star, 15-year-old Miley Cyrus, was enough to cause plenty of buzz when video of the switch was posted on the Internet.

“This tour is such a phenomenon everybody is trying to find some angle to write about it,” said Gary Bongiovanni, editor-in-chief of Pollstar, the trade publication that tracks tours. “This tour was the phenomenon of 2007 and it’s still going strong in 2008.”

A video posted on YouTube shows the 15-year-old entertainer, who stars on the hit Disney TV show “Hannah Montana,” onstage as her character, dancing and singing onstage with a group of dancers and the Jonas Brothers, also on the “Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus ‘Best of Both Worlds’” tour.

During the song, someone ushers her offstage via a trap door. Immediately, another girl dressed like the character “Hannah” in the same pink trench coat with blonde hair covering her face dances around, runs up stairs on the stage set and then quickly leaves the stage.

While the double is holding a microphone for her less than a minute, the girl motions like she is singing. However, a rep for Miley said the switch was only for costume purposes.

“To help speed the transition from Hannah to Miley, there is a production element during the performance of ‘We Got the Party’ incorporating a body double for Miley,” according to statement from the public relations firm PMK, which represents Miley.

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Paula Abdul kicks off ‘Idol’ with a meltdown

Wednesday, January 9th, 2008

With only a week to go before the new season of “American Idol,” little things like airport meltdowns from judges — specifically Paula Abdul — become very newsworthy.

“She had an insane nervous breakdown that lasted 10 minutes,” a tipster told Radaronline.com of a scene at the Continental Airlines terminal at LAX over the holidays.

“One minute she was hyperventilating and on the verge of passing out; the next she was yelling into her cell phone in this deep, rage-filled ‘Poltergeist’ voice. She kept screaming three names over and over — Michael, Sidney and Leslie. Everyone was staring at her, but she didn’t care.”

With no reality show cameras to capture the episode, it’s the tipster’s word against Abdul’s, especially since reps for Abdul didn’t comment on the meltdown by press time (which means there’s still no explanation on who Michael, Sidney or Leslie might be, or what they did to score such good placement in the tirade).

“This doesn’t surprise me at all,” said a source who’s spent many painful hours alongside the “Idol” judge. “Makes you wonder what’s in the cup on the judge’s table. She’s nice and all, but she isn’t always so together.”

 

Source: MSNBC

Britney Spears Meltdown

Monday, January 7th, 2008

Britney Spears wouldn’t give up her time with her children and started a 3 hour stand off that ended with her being taken to the hospital as she appeared to be having a mental breakdown. There was a number of reports that said that Spears was under the influence of an unknown substance according to one officier’s report. At one point she locked herself in a room with one of the children. There was no injuries reported. She was strapped to a gurney and taken to Cedars – Sinai hospital for evaluation.

TMZ is reporting that Kevin Federline’s lawyer is off to court to motion the court to remove all of Spears visitation rights with her children.

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