Or did he? Detectives working on the case have revealed that Shia only crashed because the car he ploughed into had just run a red light. That means, according to the detectives, that Shia LaBeouf was not at fault for the crash at all. So what happened?

Well, using our powerful skills of deduction we’ve worked out that, although he isn’t at fault, Shia LaBeouf still may or may not have been drunk  while he was driving the car before the crash. However, we can determine for certain that a) Shia LaBeouf is the kid from Transformers and b) Wooo.

If there’s one thing the world likes more than seeing a rising star fall, it’s seeing a rising star get smashed on booze and flip his pickup truck over, especially when it’s a rising star with as much creepy self-confidence as Shia LaBeouf.

Which is why the world had a little spring in its step on Monday after it realised that Shia LaBeouf had done exactly that. According to reports, Shia LaBeouf was driving through West Hollywood in the early hours of Sunday when he performed what’s known in the business as ‘a Haley Joel Osment‘ and flipped his car over in the middle of the street because he was drunk.

Thanks to the crash, and the badly-timed publication of an interview where Shia LaBeouf describes why he can’t drink in moderation, Shia LaBeouf has gone from being the new Tom Hanks to the new Lindsay Lohan in the blink of an eye, albeit a Lindsay Lohan with a severely Beadled-up hand.

But maybe everything wasn’t as it seemed. Although eyewitnesses saw Shia LaBeouf downing shots of whiskey on Santa Monica Boulevard right before the crash, and the arresting officers say that Shia was displaying outward signs of intoxication, it turns out that the crash wasn’t Shia LaBeouf’s fault at all. Reuters reports:

“LaBoeuf has been determined at this stage not to have caused the accident,” said Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Whitmore said the other driver failed to stop for a red light and slammed into the truck LaBeouf was driving.

So hooray! Shia LaBeouf is a responsible driver after all! Our adorable puppy-faced hero is still our adorable puppy-faced hero! Apart from the whole thing about him being shitfaced on booze! Which we’re not too sure that we understand actually!

In fact, nobody even knows if Shia LaBeouf was drunk or not any more. That’s for the toxicology tests to determine. But when those toxicology tests do come back, we’ll be able to close this case once and for all and go back to writing about more important stuff, like Keira Knightley’s tits or whatever.

Although it's becoming increasingly clear that Britney Spears is even worse at driving than she is at remembering where her knicker drawer is, the poor girl doesn't seem to be learning at all. That much is clear from the video footage that's been released of Britney Spears running a red light in her car in Los Angeles. With her children as passengers. And her mobile phone about an inch away from her face. And a bunch of panicking paparazzi screaming "Red light! Red light!" at her. And now that Kevin Federline has got wind of this video, it means that there's going to be yet another Britney Spears court hearing set for the middle of the week. Fun.

You know how all girls like to have a fat friend to make themselves look thinner than they are when they're out? Well, it seems as if Britney Spears is adopting the fat friend principle to make aspects of her own life look better than they are. For instance, if anyone else had turned in a performance as shocking as Britney Spears did at the MTV VMAs they'd be out of a career – but compared to the rest of Britney's knicklerless, bald-headed car-crash of a life her routine was actually vaguely decent.

And if you thought that Britney Spears was in the middle of an all-time worst personal slump now that she keeps losing custody of her children – to Kevin Federline, for God's sake – and can't even manage a five-minute radio interview without ditching it midway through to drift about aimlessly, then let's just remember what a genuinely awful driver Britney Spears is.

Britney Spears has already got in trouble for the following: a) Driving with her son perched on her lap, b) driving with her son's baby-seat facing in the wrong direction, c) crashing her car into another car and walking away and d) driving without a valid California driving license – but that obviously isn't enough. And that might be why Britney Spears recently tried to combine as many of these things as possible in one fell swoop.

This weekend TMZ posted a video of Britney Spears running a red light on a busy interchange with her children in her car and her mobile phone held right up to her face, despite several cars honking at her and swarms of ever-present paparazzi shouting warnings at her. And now it looks as if this video is going to cost Britney her hard-fought visitation rights, because Kevin Federline has seen it and has set up yet another court hearing for Wednesday. So, you know, expect another flood of 'Britney Spears loses her children' stories on Thursday.

But whatever you think of Britney Spears recklessly endangering the lives of her children by making illegal red-light turns on busy intersections, it's important to remember that Britney Spears is a pop star and driving badly like a rebel is exactly the sort of thing that pop stars do, as Britney's lawyer is so fond of pointing out. Of course, it might be worth pointing out to Britney Spears that another part of being a pop star is convincingly making and promoting records that don't sound like an emotionally-distressed robot short-circuiting in the Geiger counter room of a leaking nuclear substation, but that's a technicality so shut up.