' life during her well-publicized meltdown is portraying himself in court as a benevolent personal manager who saved her from ruin.
He also said he was promised 15 percent of the millions of dollars that Spears earned during their association.
Spears' mother portrayed him as a Svengali-like figure preying on Britney's vulnerabilities. Lutfi said he was actually a peacemaker, reuniting Britney with her mother after a long estrangement.
He said the superstar implored him to become her personal manager after she had fired her entire staff.
Under questioning by his lawyer, Lutfi said Spears asked him to be her personal manager in June 2007, about a month after they met and struck up a conversation at a nightclub.
Lutfi described the singer at that time as being "in crisis mode."
"She was very distraught," he said. "She was having a child custody battle and was in the middle of a divorce." He added she also had drug problems and seemed to explain Spears' infamous head-shaving incident.
"She told me someone told her they could scientifically test her hair for history of drug use, so she shaved it all off," he said on the stand, according to the New York Daily News.
He was reluctant to become her manager, he said. "I told her I had no experience as a manager for someone of her caliber. I wanted time to think about it."
But Lutfi said Spears pressed him, saying: "Sam, do you know what this job pays?"
"She said, 'I'm getting $800,000 a month even when I'm not working. You will get 15 percent of that,'" he recalled.
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