A man who impersonated Britney Spears‘ long-time manager is under investigation after he succeeded in convincing RCA Records to send him 49 unreleased Spears songs.
According to documents TMZ obtained Thursday, the suspect pretended to be Spears’ manager, Larry Rudolph, and created a fake larry.rudolph@aol.com email address. He emailed RCA Records, asking for unreleased Spears songs.
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Someone at RCA didn’t realize that it wasn’t sent from Rudolph’s real address and emailed the man 49 digital files.
Authorities say 12 of the tracks later surfaced on Spears’ August 2016 album, Glory.
Although TMZ didn’t report the suspect’s name, its law enforcement sources say the man is studying intellectual property law at UCLA. They found him after getting search warrants in October 2016 and June 2017 to look into his AOL and Microsoft records.
The suspect and his attorney told TMZ that authorities have the wrong person.
Rudolph has been working with Spears since 1998 and also worked with Miley Cyrus.
“I do little of absolutely everything,” Rudolph told The Las Vegas Sun in February 2016 about his relationship with Spears. “I’ve known her since she was a kid, so there is a mutual respect, and it works so easily. We don’t agree on everything, and agreeing on everything is never the case, but we have great conversations and sometimes debates and creative decisions. After 21 years, she does trust my judgment.”
Although Spears is ending her Las Vegas show in December, Rudolph told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in April that the show might find a new venue.
