Mel Gibson plea agreement reached for misdemeanor battery charge

Mel Gibson Reaches Plea Agreement

Mel Gibson will avoid jail time under a plea bargaining deal for his domestic violence case, an anonymous source of AP said today.

Prosecutors are set to file a charge of misdemeanor battery against the actor-director this week. Gibson is alleged to have physically hurt her former girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva in January 6, 2010.

According to the source, Mel Gibson will appear in court to enter the plea. Gibson's lawyer Blair Berk declined to reveal details of a plea bargaining agreement but said in a statement that his client's children factored heavily into the decision to make the deal.

"I know from almost 20 years as a criminal defense lawyer that sometimes justice can come for a client at too high a personal price," Berk said in a statement. "That is particularly so for Mel, whose right to due process can only be exercised in this case with an enormous media circus attached."

In addition to the domestic violence case against him, Mel Gibson has made homophobic and anti-Semitic remarks before. He has attributed his outbursts to alcoholism. A recording of the actor launching an expletive-filled tirade against Grigorieva was leaked last year.

Oksana Grigorieva reported the fight with ex-partner months after it happened, and Gibson filed charges of extortion against her shortly after.

Mel Gibson won an Academy Award for Best Director for Braveheart. Over his long career, he had made a series of Hollywood blockbusters among many other projects. But his reputation was sullied since his drunken driving arrest in 2006. Nevertheless, Hollywood and the media still put the limelight on Mel Gibson.

Posted by Kade Quinn on Thursday March 10 2011, 6:02 AM EST. Ref: AP. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Entertainment, Featured News. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0