Shia LaBeouf Arrested After Alleged Anti-Gay Rant
The actor is accused of striking two men and shouting anti-gay slurs during a violent outburst at a New Orleans bar.
Shia LaBeouf allegedly went on a rant in which he screamed at patrons, lunged at bystanders, and hurled homophobic slurs outside a New Orleans bar during Mardi Gras festivities.
Actor Jeffrey Damnit, identified in a police report by his birth name, Jeffrey Klein, told People magazine he visited the Royal Street Inn & R Bar in New Orleans’ French Quarter around 5 p.m. on Monday, February 16, and was waiting for the bartender when someone bumped into him from behind.
When he turned around, Damnit claims LaBeouf escalated the situation, telling him, “Fucking push me, I’ll kick your fucking ass.”
“And I’m like, ‘Dude, I’ve been standing still,'” Damnit told the magazine. He said LaBeouf then called him a “fucking f****t.”
Damnit, who dresses in drag and was wearing eye makeup and lipstick at the time, told The Associated Press he believes his appearance prompted LaBeouf’s hostility.
“That’s just somehow something that set him off,” Damnit said. “This guy wants me to be dead because I wear makeup. It’s a screwed up thing.”
Damnit claims he ignored the encounter and left later that evening, but when he returned around midnight on February 17, LaBeouf was still at the bar, “being a complete asshole to a lot of people.”
“He was down the bar screaming and leaning over the bar screaming at the bartender,” Damnit said. Bar staff then escorted the 39-year-old Transformers actor outside, where he continued ranting at patrons and passersby, Damnit claims.
“He was screaming at everybody, ‘You’re a fucking f****t,'” Damnit told People. “He was running around … saying, ‘Everybody’s a f****t.’ We’re just trying to stand in the way so he can’t get back in the bar. He’s lunging at a bunch of people.”
Damnit claims LaBeouf jumped at him and struck him, knocking him back, and also alleges that the actor punched a bartender in the face.
According to The Guardian, a queer man identified in a police report as Nathan Thomas Reed was also struck by LaBeouf with a closed fist during the outburst. Other patrons eventually restrained LaBeouf until law enforcement arrived.
Police arrived around 12:45 a.m., detained LaBeouf, transported him to a local hospital for medical treatment, and later booked him on two misdemeanor charges of simple battery.
A video of the altercation circulating online shows a shirtless LaBeouf shoving one person to the ground and hitting another in the face, which the police report says may have caused the man’s nose to dislocate.
Another video, recorded by Damnit and shared with The Associated Press, allegedly shows LaBeouf looking at the camera and appearing to mouth a homophobic slur, which he repeated multiple times as police arrested him, according to the police report. In the footage, he says, “I didn’t shove nobody, I never touched anybody.”
The police report states that, while he was being arrested, LaBeouf said, “These f****ts put me in jail,” and told officers he is Catholic. However, The Guardian reports those statements were omitted from a sworn police filing summarizing probable cause for the charges against him.
According to the AP, a New Orleans magistrate judge ordered LaBeouf released from custody on his own recognizance. Video from New Orleans ABC affiliate WGNO shows him dancing through the French Quarter hours later, wearing Mardi Gras beads and carrying his blue-and-white release papers in his mouth.
Louisiana law allows prosecutors to pursue hate crime enhancements when victims of violent crimes are targeted because of their “actual or perceived race, age, gender, [and] sexual orientation,” among other characteristics. It was not immediately clear whether prosecutors would seek such enhancements in LaBeouf’s case.
According to The Guardian, neither the arrest affidavit filed in court nor a police statement to the media mentioned LaBeouf’s alleged use of homophobic slurs during the altercation — making bias enhancements less likely.
LaBeouf is scheduled to appear in court on March 19.
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