LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Troubled pop star Britney Spears was due to appear in a Los Angeles court-room later Monday for a crucial hearing in her bitter custody battle with ex-husband Kevin Federline.
Spears was expected to testify at the Los Angeles County Court in an attempt to regain visitation rights to her two boys that were revoked after she was rushed to hospital on January 3 following a custody stand-off.
According to celebrity news websites, Spearss lawyers have told the 26-year-old singer she must appear at Mondays 9:30 am (1730 GMT) hearing to have any hope of regaining access to her children.
Spears was at the center of a hospital drama earlier this month when she was wheeled out of her Beverly Hills mansion by paramedics after refusing to hand over her sons to Federlines bodyguard under a visitation agreement.
Video footage of the incident showed Spears alternately smiling and looking distraught as she was lifted into an ambulance.
Spears was taken to the Cedars Sinai Medical Center for mental evaluation before she discharged herself two days later.
The exact reasons for Spears being taken to hospital have not been revealed although speculation has raged that the fallen pop princess is suffering from a long-standing psychological illness.
Multiple sources have told People magazine that Spears has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Psychologist Mark Goulston told the magazine Spears was showing "classic bipolar behavior" including "poor judgement and impulsivity."
While in hospital, the judge in Spearss custody case ordered her children to be placed in the sole care of Federline, suspending the singers visitation rights until "further order of the court."
Spears, one of the most successful pop stars of her generation, has been locked in the custody feud with Federline since the couple separated in 2006.
A judge limited the pop stars access to her children in October after she failed to submit to random drug testing as demanded at an earlier hearing where the court ruled Spears was a "habitual and continuous drug user."
The court-room drama rumbled throughout a difficult year for Spears that saw her in the news for all the wrong reasons.
She was repeatedly photographed in nightspots wearing no underwear and was also captured bizarrely shaving her head in a hair salon and attacking a photographers car with an umbrella.
Spearss family was back in the headlines again last month when it emerged that the singers 16-year-old sister, the star of a popular US television childrens show, was pregnant.
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