Sideshow: Travolta case is dropped

September 07, 2010|By Tirdad Derakhshani, Inquirer Staff Writer
  • Jerry Lewis exults as the tote board shows nearly $59 million pledged during the 45th annual Muscular Dystrophy Association Telethon, which ended Monday. "I'm heartened by the unique ability of Americans to help others in need, when they themselves are likely struggling financially," Lewis said in Las Vegas.

A judge in the Bahamas on Monday dismissed charges against two people accused of trying to extort money from John Travolta after the actor decided he no longer wanted to face the pain of a new trial stemming from the death of his teenage son on the island chain.

Prosecutor Neil Braithwaite had submitted a motion to drop the case just as a retrial was about to start for the two defendants.

"The Travolta family has said that this matter has caused them unbelievable stress and pain and they wish to put this whole thing behind them," Braithwaite told the court after a jury had been picked to hear the case.

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Ambulance driver Tarino Lightbourne and his attorney, politician Pleasant Bridgewater, were accused of threatening to release private information about the January 2009 death of Travolta's 16-year-old son, Jett, at the family vacation home in Grand Bahama.

Lightbourne, who was among the medics who treated Jett, allegedly sought $25 million from the actor with the assistance of Bridgewater, who resigned her seat in the Bahamas Senate after she was charged in the case.

A judge declared a mistrial in October, after a Bahamian lawmaker suggested that the still-deliberating jury had acquitted one of the suspects.

Jerry Hall auctioning her art

Model Jerry Hall plans to auction some of her art collection next month, including a famous portrait by Lucian Freud that shows her nude when she was eight months pregnant, Sotheby's said Monday.

The London auction will also include works by Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst, David Bailey, and other prominent artists collected by Hall, ex-paramour of Rolling Stones front man Mick Jagger.

The Freud portrait, called Eight Months Gone, is the centerpiece of the auction and is expected to fetch more than $460,000, Sotheby's specialist Oliver Barker said. "It's a wonderful painting. It was exhibited shortly after it was done at the Tate Gallery. He's always been interested in maternity. It's a very tender, loving painting."

Hall is willing to sell part of her collection because she has entered a new phase in her life, Barker said.

Venice and Joaquin

A buzz preceded actor Casey Affleck's directorial debut, I'm Still Here: Was the movie about brother-in-law Joaquin Phoenix's seemingly downward spiral from actor to hip-hop musician really a no-holds-barred documentary - or was it just a setup?

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