T.I
Facing 10 years in prison, T.I. made his initial appearance in court on Monday (October 15) to answer to weapons charges following a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives sting on Saturday in which he was charged with trying to buy machine guns and silencers.
The rapper will have plenty of time to think about the charges, since U.S. Magistrate Alan Baverman denied bond and scheduled a hearing for Friday, at which he'll decide whether there was probable cause to arrest the rapper and if T.I. will qualify for bond before a trial, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Brittany Spears
Just weeks after finally getting her California driver's license, Britney Spears turned herself in to Los Angeles police Monday night in connection with a pair of minor traffic offenses. Reuters reported that a gum-chewing Spears, wearing a black minidress, leather jacket and large designer sunglasses, spent 45 minutes being fingerprinted and photographed at a police station in the Los Angeles suburb of Van Nuys around 9 p.m. PT.
The singer was booked for an August 6 incident in a Los Angeles parking lot where her car scraped up against another parked vehicle — an incident that was captured on film by some of the many paparazzi trailing her on the outing (see "Britney Spears Charged With Two Driving-Related Misdemeanors"). At the time, Spears got out of the car, looked over the damage to her car, and then walked into a nearby building, not leaving a note for the other vehicle's owner, who filed a police report three days later.
Spears was later charged with one misdemeanor count each of hit-and-run and driving without a California driver's license, (see "Britney Spears Now Has A Valid Driver's License"), and is scheduled to be arraigned on the charges October 25 in Van Nuys Superior Court. Each count carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail or a $1,000 fine.
Nelly
NEW YORK — In the three years between Nelly's last project and his latest — the forthcoming Brass Knuckles due out November 13 — the St. Louis rapper has learned plenty, he says.
"Being away for a minute, I got a chance to see a lot," he told MTV News earlier this month. "This is probably the first time I really got a chance to pay attention to everything else [going on], and to see now from all different angles."
Maybe, then, it was that new sense of perspective that led him to ask Chuck D to contribute to the album. According to Nelly, after participating in BET's "Hip-Hop vs. America" town-hall chat with the legendary Public Enemy frontman, among others, he asked the veteran rapper to collaborate on a track called "Self Esteem."
"I don't think that people got [what Public Enemy was]," Nelly said, explaining how the song came together. "Well, what I took from Public Enemy before I got into the studio with them — just them in their moment of triumph when they were getting down — was be an individual. 'Don't believe the hype.' Right now, we believing the hype. We're trapped in believing the hype. ... I don't think Chuck was telling you what to be or when to be it, but just be it, be yourself.