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Spears’ manager accused of drugging singer

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) — A restraining order against Britney Spears’ friend and manager Sam Lutfi alleges that he drugged her, took over her life and finances and for months controlled the ravenous pack of paparazzi.

The order, based on a lengthy declaration from Spears’ mother, Lynne, says that Spears met Lutfi in October 2007 and Mr. Lutfi has essentially moved into Britney’s home and has purported to take control of her life, home and finances.

The documents released by the court Tuesday ordered Lutfi to stay away from Spears. In a section of the order detailing previous harassment, Lynne Spears said Mr. Lutfi drugged Britney, he has cut Britney’s home phone lines and removed her cell phone chargers. He yells at her. He claims to control everything — Britney’s business manager, her attorneys and the security guards at the gate.

Much of the 6-page declaration centers on the night of January 28. She outlined increasingly bizarre behavior through the night and said her daughter asked at one point, When do I get to see my babies? to which Lutfi answered, Wednesday. Watch what’s involved in the battle over Britney

Lynne Spears said she, her husband and a friend went to Britney’s home, but security guards kept everyone but her out. Once inside, Lynne Spears said she found several paparazzi.

She said there had been a big fight with Lutfi and her daughter was crying.

The paparazzi reported to Sam and addressed him with great respect. They treated him like a general.

She said during the evening, Sam had told Britney she was an unfit mother, a piece of trash and a whore, that she cares more about Adnan, her current boyfriend, than she cares about her kids and that she does not deserve her kids.

It was unclear how Lynne Spears knew details of the fight.

Lynne Spears said Britney was not home when she first arrived and she understood Lutfi had disabled all of her daughter’s cars to keep her from leaving. She said he ordered one of the photographers to take her away when he found out her parents were on their way to intervene.

Eventually, she said, Britney returned and became very agitated and could not stop moving. She cleaned the house. She changed her clothes many times. She also changed her three dogs’ clothes many times. Britney spoke to me in a tone and a level of understanding of a very young girl. Britney then picked up a bottle of pills and read the label and asked us, ‘What does insomnia mean?’ E-mail to a friend

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Chinese premier calls for patience

BEIJING, China (CNN) — Monday brought welcome relief to millions of Chinese migrant workers desperate to see their families, as the nation’s transportation system seemed to be getting back on its feet after being paralyzed by a historic winter storm.

Still, as some roads became traversable, more and more images of devastation from the past couple of weeks became apparent.

CNN saw an auto manufacturing plant — perhaps half a kilometer long — in Xiangtan, part of Hunan province, that had collapsed under the weight of snow and ice.

The government has already estimated damage from the storm — the worst in 50 years — at more than $7 billion. And the more pressing concern was getting supplies such as heating oil and food to areas that had lost power and been cut off days ago.

Prime Minister Wen Jiabao said Monday that electricity supply is gradually resuming and transport services are basically back to normal, and the country’s production and life are in normal conditions, according to state-run Xinhua news agency.

The storm struck 19 out of 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions in the Chinese mainland, Xinhua said. It has been blamed for 63 deaths — 25 of them when a bus slipped off a mountain in icy conditions in southwestern Guizhou province.

On Tuesday, China said 11 electricians had died from efforts to restore power to parts of China hit hard by the snow and ice storms, The Associated Press reported.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs said at least 223,000 homes have been crushed and another 862,000 damaged, according to Xinhua.

Nearly 1.8 million people have been relocated in the past two weeks, Xinhua said.

At Guangdong province’s Guangzhou train station — which had been one of the most heart-wrenching and dramatic scenes last week — there was no longer a massive throng of travelers clamoring and screaming to get a coveted slot on a train. Instead, the tens of thousands who remained waited in organized fashion for their turn.

To ensure no one tried to skip ahead, police in groups of four held hands and walked in front of rows of travelers.

More than 300,000 soldiers had been dispatched to the southern Guangdong province, including 12,000 to help at the train station alone.

More than 250,000 passengers made it safely onto trains in a 24-hour period, said Xian Wei Xiong, Guangzhou’s transportation director. Watch travelers struggle to get home

When I see the passengers happily getting on their trains, I feel so happy, he said. Noting that he has barely slept since the crisis set in on January 26, he added, This is the greatest national disaster we have ever met.

And — in a telling sign from a dedicated Chinese Communist Party official — Xian added, there are lessons to be learned.

We should reconsider how much pressure the transportation network in our nation can stand.

Jiao Meiyan, director general of China’s National Meteorological Center, predicted fairly good weather in most of south China through the end of the week, giving the nation a chance to clear clogged highways and move goods.

Zhuhai-Beijing highway, China’s major north-south transport artery, reopened Monday.

It could also lift morale as the nation celebrates the Lunar New Year on Thursday. Many Chinese hope to make it home by Wednesday for Lunar New Year’s Eve.

Still, forecasters warned temperatures could be freezing at night. Another cold front is expected to sweep through China in the coming week, but is expected to be short and relatively mild.
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McCain wins key Super Tuesday endorsement

(CNN) — GOP front-runner Sen. John McCain has won a key endorsement from ex-New York Gov. George Pataki, in a last-minute show of support that may sway some Super Tuesday voters.

McCain also has won the support of Arnold Schwarzenegger, governor of delegate-rich California.

Those endorsements could play a role in Tuesday’s vote, as the support of Florida Gov. Charlie Crist did in his state’s primary.

According to exit polls, more than 40 percent of Florida primary voters indicated Crist’s decision to back McCain had an effect on their vote, and those voters went to McCain overwhelmingly. Watch what experts are saying about McCain

Recent polls show McCain with a comfortable edge heading into Tuesday’s 21 Republican contests.

Rival Mitt Romney spent his final day of campaigning trying to chip away at McCain’s lead by attacking his conservative credentials.

Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, has been telling voters he is the conservative alternative to McCain.

Romney has been trying to tap into anger at McCain, reminding voters the Arizona senator voted against tax cuts and supported campaign finance reform.

We disagree on a number of issues, and if you look at Sen. McCain’s position on a number of issues, you have a hard time distinguishing him from Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, he said Monday.

Romney told supporters in Georgia he is definitely the underdog compared to Sen. McCain.

But the nice thing about being the underdog is that we typically win, he said.

Romney, along with former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, is campaigning in the Southeast before making a last-minute stop in California, where McCain and Romney are neck-and-neck.

Romney Sunday suggested Huckabee get out of the race because he was splitting the conservative vote. Watch why Romney thinks Huckabee should quit

The truth of the matter is — he’s a good man. Everybody has every right to stay in this race until the very end, Romney said on CNN’s Late Edition.

We all battled in Florida. Sen. McCain and I came in No. 1 and No. 2, very close, and he came in a distant fourth. I think by virtue of that, I think most people around the country have said, OK, it’s been narrowed down to a two-person race.

Huckabee shot back Monday on CNN’s American Morning, disputing the notion he was siphoning off Romney voters. Watch Huckabee describe what’s at stake for him on Tuesday

He suggested that I get out of the race and has the audacity to say that the reason is because the voters that I’m getting are voters that would go to him, Huckabee said.

I think it’s incredibly presumptuous and even arrogant to suggest that the voters who are voting for me would automatically gravitate to him. I think they, quite frankly, would not.

Huckabee has been trying to get his voice heard, reminding voters that this is not a two-man race as he campaigns throughout the South, with stops in Alabama, Tennessee and his home state of Arkansas.

Huckabee has accused Romney of engaging in voter suppression, but Romney said that’s not the right word.

It’s not voter suppression. I want people to vote, but I want them to vote for me, Romney said while campaigning in Atlanta, Georgia. First, a couple of rules in politics. One - no whining, and No. 2 - You get them to vote for you, and so I want them not to vote for Mike Huckabee and not to vote for John McCain and to vote for me.

In his final hours of campaigning, McCain was darting across the Northeast, making stops in Romney’s backyard. He spent Monday morning in Massachusetts — where Romney was governor for four years. See which states are up for grabs

McCain has been attacking Romney for raising taxes, while refuting claims he’s not conservative enough.

I want to tell you, and look you in the eye, my friend, as president of the United States, I will preserve my proud conservative Republican credentials, but I will reach across the aisle to the Democrats and work together for the good of this country.

That’s what you want us to do, McCain said at a rally in Boston, Massachusetts.

Polls suggest McCain has large leads in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Illinois, but he’s only ahead by single digits in Georgia and Missouri.

The key to many races is undecided voters, which could make up from 10 to 15 percent of those who cast ballots.

The Republicans have 1,020 delegates at stake in the 15 primaries and six caucuses Tuesday.

To become the Republican nominee, a candidate must win 1,191 delegates. See why the delegates matter

So far, McCain leads in delegates with 97. He’s followed by Romney with 92, Huckabee with 29 and Texas Rep. Ron Paul with six.

Huckabee won Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucuses, but has yet to take any other states. McCain won New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida, and Romney finished first in Maine, Nevada, Michigan and Wyoming.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. national poll results, released Monday, show McCain with the support of 44 percent of registered Republicans. Romney came in second with 29 percent.

Huckabee had 18 percent, followed by Paul with 6 percent.

The poll, conducted February 1-3, has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percentage points.

CNN’s poll of polls of the Republican race puts McCain at 45 percent compared with 24 percent for Romney.

The poll of polls is an average of five national polls conducted in February. Those five surveys were done by CNN/Opinion Research Corp., Gallup, Pew, ABC and CBS.
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Video: Holloway suspect ‘didn’t lose sleep’ over dumped body

(CNN) — On video, Joran van der Sloot says he didn’t lose a minute of sleep over knowing Natalee Holloway’s motionless body had been taken out to sea and dumped.

In the video that aired Sunday on Dutch television, van der Sloot, a suspect in the 2005 disappearance of Holloway, told a man he was with the Alabama teen on an Aruban beach when she died and that a friend of his with a boat disposed of Holloway’s body.

He went out to sea and then he threw her out, like an old rag, van der Sloot told Aruban businessman Patrick van der Eem January 16. Van der Eem recorded their conversations on hidden cameras installed in the Range Rover he was driving, according to the Dutch TV report. Watch van der Sloot on hidden camera

Aruba’s chief prosecutor, Hans Mos, called the account that aired very impressive and announced he was reopening the investigation.

Van der Sloot later said the statements were lies, and on Monday his attorney said the video contains no admission of a crime.

In the video, van der Sloot says Holloway and her friends begged him to go out with them the night of May 29, 2005. Watch CNN’s Frederik Pleitgen report on the new video

The Dutch student said he and two friends — brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe — met the women at a bar in Oranjestad.

When they arrived, he said, the women appeared to have been drinking heavily and some were using cocaine.

Holloway was in Aruba with about 100 classmates celebrating their graduation from Mountain Brook High School in suburban Birmingham, Alabama.

After declining an invitation from Holloway to dance on stage with her, he agreed to drink a shot of liquor from her navel as she lay on the bar, he said.

About 1 a.m. May 30, he said, she left the bar with him and the Kalpoes, telling her friends she would meet them at their hotel before their planned return flight the next day to the United States, he said.

The three men previously told authorities they then drove to the beach with Holloway, leaving her there when she told them she wanted to stay.

But van der Sloot gave a different account in the hidden-camera footage. He said he wanted to have sex with Holloway, but she told him she did not want to go to her hotel. Instead, she said, she wanted to see sharks, he told the informant.

The two brothers then used their car to drive van der Sloot and Holloway to the beach by the hotel and left them, van der Sloot said.

He and Holloway then had sex, he said. But as they were caressing each other, she started shaking, then said nothing, he said.

All of a sudden, what she did was like in a movie, he said. She was shaking, it was awful. … I prodded her, there was nothing.

He said he panicked and, when she did not appear to be alive, shook her but was unable to resuscitate her. He said he carried her body to a stand of trees, walked to a pay phone near the pool of the hotel and, instead of using his cell phone, called a friend who owned a boat that was tied up at a nearby dock.

Upon the friend’s arrival, the two men carried Holloway’s body to the boat, and the friend told van der Sloot to go home, he said. The student then walked back to his house, where his father was asleep when he arrived about 15 minutes later, he recounted. He estimated the time at 2:30 or 3 a.m.

Van der Sloot said the boat owner showed up at his house later in the morning and told him he had taken the body out less than a mile from land and dumped it overboard.

He added that the incident with the woman has not bothered him.

I didn’t lose a minute of sleep over it, he said.

The video footage shows van der Sloot is not innocent, Holloway’s mother said Monday.

Once people see the video, there are no more questions; there is no one that could walk away from this believing that he is innocent, Beth Twitty told ABC.

Twitty described the video as a source of comfort, saying it means everything.

I felt that it put an end to my nightmare, she said. The nightmare is not knowing, and I feel as if now, I can begin the mourning and the healing process for losing a child.

She added, Not knowing is the absolute cruelest thing that a person can endure.

Van der Sloot’s attorney, Joe Tacopina, told ABC Monday that there’s no confession, there’s no admission of a crime by Joran on any of these tapes.

He said much of what was in the video is easily disprovable based on corroborative evidence. … The fact of the matter is he still is not responsible. The evidence, not Joran, the evidence, says he’s not responsible for Natalee’s death.

Tacopina added, I’m certainly not asking at this point for anyone to believe Joran. … Clearly his credibility is zero.

Last week, van der Sloot called the Dutch television program Pauw Witteman and acknowledged having made the comments but said they were lies.

That is what he wanted to hear, so I told him what he wanted to hear, van der Sloot said.

A judge denied a prosecution request that van der Sloot, the son of a lawyer, be detained in the Netherlands, where he is a student. The judge did determine that sufficient reason exists to reopen the inquiry against van der Sloot. Watch CNN’s Frederik Pleitgen report on the new video

In a statement, the Office of the Public Prosecutor said Sunday it will appeal the judge’s decision barring van der Sloot’s arrest but cautioned the report does not necessarily solve the case.

There is a big difference between the reality of a courtroom and the reality of a television screen, it said. Watch a CNN legal analyst discuss the Holloway case

On Monday, Tacopina said at least two points of his client’s story could be disproved. He said the Aruban coast guard had checked the pay phone where van der Sloot said he had called his friend, and the records show that there’s no such call.

Also, Tacopina said, the friend whom his client names in the video met van der Sloot two months ago, and the friend wasn’t in Aruba in May 2005. He also has never owned a boat, the attorney said.

Van der Eem, the informant, told ABC he befriended van der Sloot by pretending to be a gangster after meeting him in a casino.

Why did I want this? It’s obvious. Everybody was looking for the truth. For her mother, he said.
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5 children among carnival fire dead

(CNN) — At least nine people — five of them children — were killed after a fire gutted an apartment building in southwestern Germany while revelers were celebrating carnival, police said Monday.

A fire official in Ludwigshafen told CNN at least 60 more people were injured in the blaze. Twenty-four of them remained hospitalized Monday, he said. The rest of the wounded have been treated and released.

Unfortunately, we cannot exclude further victims, police spokeswoman Simone Eisenbarth told The Associated Press.

The carnival tradition stems from the Roman Catholic regions in the west and south of Germany. Like Mardi Gras in New Orleans and Carnival in Brazil, it is a time when residents dress up and take to the streets in celebration.

The fire broke out about 4:23 p.m. (1523 GMT) on Sunday in a four-story apartment building, city police said in a statement. Its cause was unclear.

Firefighters battled through the evening and into the night to bring the blaze under control. Two adjacent apartment buildings were evacuated as a safety precaution, the statement said.

Fearing that there may be other victims, rescue crews brought in a large crane that lowered fire fighters into the shell of the building to conduct an initial check for additional bodies.

Rescue crews have been unable to thoroughly search because the damage to the building was so severe that authorities think it may no longer be structurally sound.

Ludwigshafen is a port city on the west bank of the Rhine River. It is noted for its large chemical industry and is a gateway to the wine-growing region of the Rhine.
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