Nolte escapes burning home Barker 'thankful to be alive'
Published Thursday October 9th, 2008
Nick Nolte has escaped a fire that burned a Malibu home to the ground.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department says the actor slightly cut his hand when he broke a window and fled the home shortly after 11:30 a.m. Tuesday. The Sheriff's Department says an electrical malfunction caused the fire, which caused an estimated $3.5 million (U.S.) in damage and left the home a total loss.
A call and email to Nolte's publicist Arnold Robinson were not immediately returned.
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A lawyer for Britney Spears has rejected a plea offer that would have placed her on a year's probation and forced her to pay a $150 (U.S.) fine in her misdemeanour driver's licence case.
Lawyer J. Michael Flanagan says Spears would consider an offer that reduces the charge to an infraction and requires her to pay a $10 fine. He says if the case does go to trial as scheduled later this month, he will appeal any conviction.
He says the 26-year-old singer is being unfairly targeted because she is a celebrity and doesn't deserve a blemish on her criminal record.
The charge is the last remnants of a criminal case that city prosecutors lodged against Spears after she hit a parked car in August 2007 and left without notifying the owner.
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Former Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker, who always has been afraid of flying, says he's glad to be alive after suffering severe burns in a fiery plane crash last month.
"I hate planes," Barker said in an interview with Us Weekly magazine. "My biggest fear ever is to be involved in a plane crash, so when that happened... well, I'm just thankful to be alive! I'm just grateful to be here at all."
The 32-year-old musician and celebrity disc jockey DJ AM were the only survivors of the crash just before midnight Sept. 19 at the main airport in Columbia, S.C. Two pilots and two other passengers were killed, including Barker's assistant Chris Baker.
Barker was released from a Georgia hospital last week and is now being treated at a burn centre in Los Angeles. He said he was too afraid to fly cross-country, so he arranged to travel by bus with his father and ex-wife Shanna Moakler to keep him company.
"I am doing the best I can possibly be," he said in the magazine's latest issue. "I'm so anxious to get out of here. ... I've just been in surgery after surgery. I have third-degree burns basically from my feet up to my waist and both hands. One of my hands has second-degree burns and one has third-degree burns."
"I'm trying to have a quick recovery and play the drums again and be able to hold my kids again," said Barker, who has two children, Landon, 5, and Alabama, 2, with Moakler.
If all goes well, Barker expects to leave the hospital within two weeks.
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Dan Rather's lawyer says he could have made millions of dollars more per year if CBS had not defrauded him before firing him.
Martin Gold discussed the finances after a hearing on Rather's $70-million (U.S.) breach-of-contract lawsuit.
Rather says he was removed from the evening news anchor chair and given little to do after a disputed September 2004 60 Minutes II story about President Bush's military service.
CBS' lawyers say Rather was paid everything he was owed and the network used his talents as the contract required.
Gold said the network was supposed to use Rather on other news shows or pay him and let him go.
Gold said CBS held on to the 77-year-old newsman and denied him a chance to take a $4 million-a-year job at another network.
The lawyer said Tuesday that Rather now earns about $1.5 million at the high-definition TV network HDNet.
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