Phil Spector may sell LA mansion to pay for appeal

Phil Spector, sentenced on Friday to life imprisonment with a minimum of 19 years for the murder of Lana Clarkson, has taken steps to sell his 30-room Los Angeles mansion - known locally as the Castle - to help pay for his appeal.

The 'Wall of Sound' music producer has already blown an estimated $15m on legal bills, seeking to explain how the B-movie actress died at his home in February 2003 and why he staggered out of the house with a gun his hand and told his chauffeur "I think I killed somebody".

According to press reports, Spector has asked his 28-year-old wife Rachelle to put the house on the market and place his many valuable rock 'n' roll artefacts in storage: they include musical instruments given to him by John Lennon, for whom he produced Imagine, and Ike Turner, first husband of Tina Turner, whose reputations he launched with River Deep - Mountain High.

The catch is that the house is unlikely to realise anything like its recent value: first, the global economic turndown has taken its toll on LA property prices, and second, while its history as the location of a celebrity murder may be attractive to the ghoulish, it tends to diminish a property's value. Local estate agents believe the mansion's value has fallen by a third, to somewhere less than $1m.

While his lawyers prepare for an appeal, 69-year-old Spector has been busy on his laptop, blogging on the Twitter site. On his return to his cell at LA County Jail after sentencing on Friday, he 'tweeted': "As if it wasn't bad enough I got locked up for 19 years, the bastards even confiscated my wig." ·