After years of supermarket tabloid speculation, married pop stars Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown appear headed for divorce. On Friday, Houston, who has a home in Alpharetta, filed a petition for separation in California where she is currently living while working on a comeback album with producer Clive Davis.

Houston's Atlanta attorney Mark Trigg confirmed the filing Wednesday afternoon.

"Under California state law, if you haven't been a resident for six months, you must first file a petition for separation," Trigg explained. "But Ms. Houston considers this divorce action."

Brown's Atlanta attorney Phaedra C. Parks confirmed that her client had been served with the legal papers. Parks said that her client remains in the Atlanta area but did not have any additional comment Wednesday afternoon.

Almost since their wedding on July 28, 1992, the high-profile pair have remained lodged in the headlines, following scrapes with the law, rumors regarding their marriage and a much-watched (and much mocked) gritty reality series on Bravo, "Being Bobby Brown." The couple has a 13-year-old daughter, Bobbi Kristina.

In January of this year, as rumors swirled in Atlanta about the stability of their marriage, Brown went on WBLS-FM in New york and told talk show host Wendy Williams: "There's no divorce. We're together. I'm out working and she's home with the baby. I miss you, baby, wherever you are."

In February, reporters from The Atlanta Journal-Constition and the Associated Press chased a report regarding a possible Houston-Brown split after anonomous tips were made to the news organizations.

Houston, 43, had her greatest musical success in the 1980s and '90s when she had several No. 1 records on Billboard's Hot 100 including the megahit "I Will Always Love You," from the 1992 film "The Bodyguard," in which she starred opposite Kevin Costner.

Houston has not been as active in the last decade and has battled drug problems.

In recent years she's been an executive producer on the popular Raven-Symone films "The Cheetah Girls" and "The Cheetah Girls 2."

Her musician husband recently reunited with his old soul group New Edition for a show at July's Essence Musical Festival. The show got mixed reviews from the audience when Brown jumped suggestively around the stage and made vulgar remarks about his sex life with Houston.

Brown, 37, has had a history of drug and alcohol arrests and was sentenced to 90 days in jail in 2004 for missing three months of child support payments for two other children.

He was arrested in March on minor motor-vehicle violations dating back 14 years when he visited Webster, Mass., to watch one of his children take part in a cheerleading tournament.