Cher and her son Elijah Blue Allman have agreed to place their conservatorship battle on ice while they try to resolve their dispute behind closed doors, new court filings in Los Angeles reveal.
The temporary truce was reached at a private mediation held May 7, according to paperwork obtained by Rolling Stone. “At the conclusion of the mediation, the parties agreed to pause all legal proceedings and related activities, including all discovery and motion practice, to allow the parties to continue working together to privately and confidentially resolve this matter,” the parties’ joint agreement submitted to the court says.
The superstar singer and her only child with late musician Gregg Allman disclosed their hopes for a “private resolution” while asking the judge on their case for a three-month delay in proceedings. The judge signed off on the request Tuesday, pushing the next hearing in the case out to Sept. 13.
Cher first sought conservatorship control over Allman in a Dec. 27, 2023 petition that cited his alleged “ongoing mental health and substance abuse” issues. Her lawyers appeared at an initial hearing in early January and asked for an emergency ruling granting control over Allman’s finances ahead of an expected distribution from his father’s estate. It was denied on the basis that Allman deserved more time to review and respond to his mother’s claims. Cher appeared by video at a follow-up hearing three weeks later but was again denied conservatorship powers pending a larger hearing. Allman attended both hearings in person and objected to his mom’s petition. At a third hearing in March, Cher was granted her first three-month delay to gather medical records ahead of a June 11 hearing. Her lawyers said the singer was willing to pay for private mediation in the meantime if Allman would agree to participate. “Cher would very much would like the opportunity to make sure she’s taken every possible step to try to resolve this informally,” her lawyer Gabrielle Vidal told the court.
Cher’s lawyers have argued she fears for her son’s safety because beyond his battle with addiction, “there is a secondary issue in that he suffers from schizoaffective disorder that leads to periods of psychosis.” Vidal said Allman had been placed on involuntary hospital holds “multiple times over the past calendar year,” including last September. The lawyer said Cher was terrified that “his life is at risk,” and that he was too vulnerable to safely manage the estimated $120,000 he receives each year as his inheritance.
“We feel an urgency persists because he’s surrounded by people who deny the mental illness component, and the concern is that if he gets this distribution into his hands, and during a period of stress, that that will lead to the drug use. This proceeding was filed because Cher was told unequivocally by the doctors treating him, that if she did not take this step as his mother, the concern was that he would once again end up on the street,” Vidal previously told the court.
The judge on the case has said she believes Cher’s concerns about her son are sincere, but a certain level of evidence is required to find a lack of capacity sufficient to grant a conservatorship. “I don’t question the motivation behind Cher’s request as having been driven by concern for her son,” Judge Jessica Uzcategui said in January. “And I understand the perhaps overlapping issues with respect to substance abuse and mental health that have affected the proposed conservatee in the past. I don’t think he questions that either. I see a lot of acknowledgment of that in some of the paperwork.” But concerns are not “sufficient evidence,” she said.
In court filings, Allman has said he tested negative for drugs and alcohol in a series of voluntary tests in January and had rented a new residence in Westwood with his wife amid their reconciliation. (Allman filed for divorce from wife Marie Angela King in 2021 but requested, and received, a dismissal of the action in January.) He told the court he also was in the process of hiring a business manager. “In the two weeks since the initial hearing, I have been successfully managing my income and expenses and have refrained from the use of illicit substances that have historically caused the incidents that have given rise to my mother’s concern,” Allman wrote.
“I am doing well and do not need the help that my mother is offering,” he said. “There was no emergency giving rise to a conservatorship at the last hearing, and there is certainly none now.”
In her original petition, Cher said she only wished to protect her son. “Petitioner loves Elijah immensely and has always acted with his best interests in mind,” her filing back in December said.
