A choose in Los Angeles is ready to contemplate on Tuesday whether or not to determine a conservatorship for an 83-year-old former member of the Supremes, whose household has argued that her bodily and psychological frailties have made her susceptible to undue affect for years.

The singer, Cindy Birdsong, spent almost a decade with the group after changing one in every of its authentic members, Florence Ballard, in 1967, performing hits corresponding to “Cease! Within the Title of Love” and “I Hear a Symphony” as one-third of Motown’s marquee act.

However after Birdsong left the Supremes in 1976, her funds fell aside — a state of affairs she later attributed to a “unhealthy closing deal” with Motown Data — and in a while, a number of strokes left her unable to look after herself or handle her affairs, her household has mentioned.

Birdsong’s siblings have requested that the singer’s brother, Ronald Birdsong, function co-conservator alongside an leisure enterprise supervisor, Brad Herman. It was Herman, known as in by a buddy of Birdsong’s, who spearheaded the singer’s removing two years in the past from an condominium the place she lived with a longtime buddy.

The household has mentioned the buddy, Rochelle Lander, remoted them from Birdsong and withheld details about her ailing well being. They’ve argued {that a} conservatorship is required to make sure that her care and funds are being correctly managed. Birdsong, who isn’t identified to have retained important music royalty rights, is at present in a California nursing facility the place she is on a feeding tube, in line with courtroom papers.

“Since I stay outdoors of California, and since my sister has been unable to are inclined to her affairs herself,” Ronald Birdsong mentioned within the conservatorship software, “I rely on Mr. Herman to maintain me up to date on Cindy’s well-being in addition to serving to to maintain all of her affairs so as.”

Final month, the choose assigned to the case, Lee R. Bogdanoff, referred it to the Workplace of the Public Guardian, indicating that he’ll take into account whether or not a third-party conservator ought to step in to handle Birdsong’s affairs. His rationale for the choice was not made public, however he based mostly it on the findings of a confidential report by a courtroom investigator.

Herman and Terri Birdsong, a sister of Cindy Birdsong’s, mentioned they have been working with a newly employed lawyer to fill in among the data that was missing of their preliminary conservatorship software, and that they anticipated the singer’s court-appointed lawyer to ask for a delay within the case whereas they did so.

The court-appointed lawyer, John Alan Cohan, didn’t reply to requests for remark.

It’s unclear whether or not Lander, a former performer with whom Cindy Birdsong began a Christian ministry, is planning to problem the household’s bid for a conservatorship. She has defended her care of the singer previously, saying that she had been steadfastly devoted to serving to her over a few years, and he or she has displayed an influence of lawyer that she mentioned Birdsong signed greater than a decade in the past.

The tensions between Birdsong’s siblings and Lander mounted a couple of years in the past, throughout a go to to the singer’s Los Angeles condominium, the place the household mentioned it was surprised by how her situation had deteriorated, in line with interviews together with her three residing siblings and a sister-in-law. The household finally reached out to the police, who enforced Birdsong’s removing from the condominium in 2021.

In a video taken by Herman that evening, Lander argued in opposition to the removing, citing her energy of lawyer papers.

“She must have due course of earlier than you are available in forcefully and suppose you’re going to take over her life,” Lander mentioned within the video, as a number of law enforcement officials stood within the hallway of the condominium constructing.

Lander has not agreed to an interview and didn’t reply to requests for remark in regards to the courtroom proceedings.

Herman, who holds an influence of lawyer signed by the three siblings and sister-in-law, mentioned the household needs the authorized continuing to assist make clear how the singer’s cash has been managed in recent times.

“From the time I turned energy of lawyer, I’ve been making an attempt to get paperwork that inform me what rights, what royalties, what residuals are coming to Cindy,” Herman mentioned in a current interview. “No matter monies have are available in, the place did they go?”

Although it was well-known that Birdsong had stopped performing and largely slipped from public view, the extent of her deterioration prompted an outpouring of concern a number of weeks in the past, round when the household filed its conservatorship software.

“Prayers for a girl who has meant a lot to my life,” one fan wrote on a Fb web page devoted to Birdsong.

Some associates and associates of Birdsong, like Jim Saphin, who befriended the singer within the ’60s and ran a British fan membership for Diana Ross and the Supremes, mentioned that they had been dismayed to listen to of the singer’s situation.

Steve Weaver, a file producer who lives in England and has labored with former Supremes, mentioned he had spoken with shut associates of Birdsong’s who had visited her in current weeks and reported that she had not been capable of converse.

“However taking part in Supremes data actually boosts her up,” Weaver mentioned he had been informed.

Charlo Crossley-Fortier, a singer and actress who turned associates with Birdsong after assembly her at church, and John Whyman, a buddy because the ’70s who at one level invited the singer to stay with him amid monetary struggles, mentioned that they had turn into involved over time that Lander had been isolating Birdsong from different family and friends and had actively resisted her pursuit of any position in pop music.

Weaver recalled that a couple of decade in the past, he was set to file a monitor with Birdsong when Lander intervened and declared that Birdsong was “not recording any secular music now.” Birdsong, who typically recalled how Christianity had lifted her out of great melancholy after leaving the Supremes, as soon as mentioned in a tv interview with “The 700 Membership” that she didn’t “have a want to sing rock ’n’ roll anymore,” preferring to sing non secular music as an alternative.

Although Birdsong’s life took a pointy flip after leaving the Supremes, Crossley-Fortier mentioned, “Cindy will endlessly be a part of music historical past.”