Looks like Britney Spears caught a rare break from the Los Angeles Police Department last night, when she was pulled over along with a scrum of paparazzi following her at a high rate of speed in Mission Hills. According to an LAPD spokeswoman, four photographers—including one working for X17 and one for Fame—driving four separate vehicles were arrested for reckless driving and held on $5,000 bail.

Spears herself, though, was briefly detained and let go after officers checked her license. Which is odd, given the fact that the guys who were arrested for speeding were chasing her. "We have not determined that she was speeding," the LAPD spokeswoman says, incoherently.

It's a tactic often employed by L.A. cops—let the celebs speed off, or run red lights, and then bust the paparazzi when they follow suit—one that many paps complained about in Radar's June 2007 look at the pap biz. "I remember a couple of times Brad Pitt would roll out of his driveway doing 90," one photographer told Radar at the time, "and as soon as he went by, the cops pulled over five or six paps."

In this instance, the cops took the unusual step of at least pulling the celebrity over, perhaps to check for unsecured toddlers.