Celebrities

Listening to Kate Gosselin stutter and sniff her way through her recent chats with "Today's" Meredith Vieira, it was hard to keep a straight face. Kate doesn't blame the decision to participate in TLC's "Jon & Kate Plus 8" for the disintegration of her marriage; it probably would have happened anyway. Really? Your husband would have left you for a Star reporter and/or the daughter of the plastic surgeon who gave you a tummy tuck (free, because it was filmed), even if you had just remained some obscure church-going Pennsylvania family with a bunch of kids?

She's a quasi political player, an eccentric former entertainer whose intense spirituality is ripe for tabloid fodder. She claims she knew actor Tom Cruise in a former life and once visited the planet Venus in a triangular spaceship. Miyuki Hatoyama, the wife of newly elected Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, is a free-spirited woman whose views are drawing Western attention since her husband's Democratic Party of Japan swept into power in a historic leadership change last weekend.

Before there was Roman Polanski, there was Errol Flynn. Before David Letterman, Charlie Chaplin. Celebrity sex scandals have been around for as long as there have been celebrities -- yes, even before TMZ and Perez Hilton -- so the recent arrest of Polanski relating to his having sex with a 13-year-old girl and Letterman's confession of having sex with female members of his staff are just the latest in a long and sometimes sordid history. "This is nothing new for the media and the public to become obsessed with this and report this in juicy, lurid, titillating detail," says film historian and critic Stephen Farber, who notes that there is "this very moralistic side to this country that sort of plays on that.

Like many teenage girls, these friends were fascinated by the high fashion and flashy bling of such young Hollywood celebrities as Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Audrina Patridge. But unlike other fans, they allegedly didn't stop at Hollywood fantasy. According to Los Angeles police detectives, the group studied television shows, celebrity magazines and websites picking out clothing and jewelry they wanted. Then they figured out where the celebrities lived and, after casing the homes, broke in and took what they wanted, detectives allege.

The methods allegedly used by a group of teenagers suspected by authorities of burglarizing the homes of such stars as Lindsay Lohan, Orlando Bloom and Paris Hilton have again raised concerns about the intrusive glare of the paparazzi. According to detectives, the group used celebrity websites and paparazzi photos to track schedules and movements of the people they are suspected of burglarizing. They looked for times when the stars were scheduled to either be out of town or attending movie premieres and other events, police said.

The roster of young celebrities allegedly victimized by the so-called bling ring expanded Wednesday as Los Angeles police detectives said the group targeted Brian Austin Green, Ashley Tisdale and Megan Fox as part of a string of at least 10 burglaries in the Hollywood Hills. So far, at least eight celebrities -- including Paris Hilton, Audrina Patridge, Lindsay Lohan, Rachel Bilson and Orlando Bloom -- have allegedly had property stolen by the gang that police said was made up primarily of teenage girls, most of whom attended the same continuation school in Agoura Hills.

A Los Angeles judge has granted a temporary restraining order against two paparazzi accused of stalking Nicole Richie and her children. The order, signed Friday by L.A. Superior Court Judge David S. Cunningham, requires that the men, Eduardo Arrivabene and Ivon Miguel, stay at least 100 feet away from Richie and her children, Harlow Madden, 2, and Sparrow Madden, 6 weeks. In a statement attached to the order, Richie said that she was involved in a car crash on Oct. 5 as the men were attempting to photograph her with her family.

Police recovered Paris Hilton's designer perfume, a pistol belonging to actor Brian Austin Green and a handwritten inventory listing diamonds and other jewelry at the homes of suspects accused of burglarizing the homes of young Hollywood celebrities, according to a search warrant affidavit obtained by The Times. The affidavit by Los Angeles Police Department detectives names five alleged members of the burglary crew -- Jonathan Ajar, Courtney Ames, Roy Lopez Jr., Alexis Neiers and Diana Tamayo -- who were charged last week with residential burglary and other felonies in connection with at least 10 burglaries in the Hollywood Hills from late 2008 to last month.

Authorities arrested suspects accused of burglarizing the homes of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and other young celebrities after a member of the alleged "bling ring" confessed, according a search warrant affidavit obtained by The Times. The search warrant said the crew would surf the Internet to find where the celebrities lived, then watched the locations and worked out ways to break into the homes. In many of the cases, the doors were simply left open. In the case of Hilton and actress Rachel Bilson, the crew broke in numerous times, according to the search warrant affidavit filed at a Las Vegas court.

Robert Joel Halderman did not think he was breaking the law when he allegedly demanded $2 million from David Letterman in exchange for the rights to a screenplay treatment about the talk show host's affairs with female staffers, a lawyer for the CBS News producer said Tuesday. In a motion to dismiss the case filed in New York Supreme Court, defense attorney Gerald Shargel claimed Halderman's actions did not meet the state's definition of extortion because he had a right to sell his story idea.