Martha Stewart will pay $195,000 to settle charges

Homemaking diva Martha Stewart will pay about $195,000 and cannot serve as the director of a public company for five years under a settlement announced Monday on civil insider trading charges with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Under the settlement, the founder of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc., a multimedia empire dedicated to stylish living, agreed to make a payment relating to losses the government said she avoided on her sale of ImClone Systems Inc. stock in December 2001.

Stewart agreed to pay $45,673, the amount of losses she avoided from her insider trading, plus $12,389 in interest. But the bulk of the payment comes from the maximum civil penalty of $137,019, three times the amount of losses avoided.

In settling the charges, Stewart and her broker, Peter Bacanovic, neither admitted nor denied the allegations in the SEC complaint.

Madonna doesn’t shy away from religious themes

Rome – Religious leaders may have snubbed Madonna, but Italian fans cheered the pop star as she staged a mock crucifixion at her concert in Rome.

A crowd of 70,000 attended Sunday night’s performance at Olympic Stadium, some two miles from the Vatican. The scene of Madonna on a mirrored cross and wearing a crown of thorns, part of her worldwide “Confessions” tour, had drawn fire from religious leaders, who condemned it as an act of hostility toward the Roman Catholic Church.

Madonna’s representatives have said the performance on the cross, which has been included from the outset of the tour in May, is not disrespectful toward the church.

The 47-year-old singer is known for her theatrical, action-packed shows. Besides her rendition of “Live to Tell” while on the cross, her two-hour performance included two dancers with a Star of David and a Muslim crescent painted on their torsos who embraced and held hands during their routine.

A figure wearing a robe and turban did a solo on the shofar, a ram’s horn traditionally blown during the Jewish high holidays, then joined Madonna, who is a kabbalist, to perform “Isaac,” a song about Yitzhak Luria, a 16th-century Jewish mystic and kabbalah scholar.

Manilow to have surgery

Los Angeles – Barry Manilow will take a break from his regular gig at the Las Vegas Hilton to undergo surgery to repair torn cartilage in both hips, his publicist said.

The 60-year-old singer, who has a four-year contract with the hotel, suffers from labrum tears in his hips – a painful condition exacerbated by his high-energy performances, publicist Carol Marshall said in a statement Sunday.

Manilow will continue performing through his appearance at the Emmy Awards on Aug. 27 and will then have outpatient arthroscopic surgery at a Southern California hospital, Marshall said.

Recovery and rehabilitation time is expected to be about eight weeks.

He is scheduled to return in mid-October for the launch of his new album, “The Greatest Songs of the Sixties.”

Author sues Clay Aiken

Raleigh, N.C. – The author of an “unauthorized tribute” to Clay Aiken is suing the “American Idol” singer, claiming he defamed her and conspired to stifle sales of her book.

Jeannie Holleman, 50, says she is a lifelong friend and neighbor of a Raleigh family that were friends with Aiken’s mother, Faye Parker, and took her in when Parker and her young son left her abusive husband.

Holleman’s 2005 book, “Out of the Blue – ‘Clay’ it Forward,” incorporates interviews from the McGhee family and her own recollections with stories from Aiken’s fans.

In the lawsuit, filed Friday in Wake County Superior Court, Holleman claims Aiken, his mother and others conspired to defame her and depress sales of her book by denying they knew her, branding her stories as lies and demeaning the book on Aiken fans’ Web sites.

The lawsuit also claims a bodyguard for Aiken manhandled Holleman at a fundraiser in Hawaii.

A telephone message left Sunday at Parker’s home was not returned. Messages left with Aiken’s management company were not returned.

The lawsuit seeks at least $260,000 in damages and asks the court to order Aiken to retract the critical comments or endorse the book on his official Web site, to write a positive introduction for the book and to sell the book at his concerts for at least five years.