Gibson Issues Statement Of Apology In DUI Incident

A rant got him into trouble – now Mel Gibson is hoping a profuse apology will get him out of it.

The Oscar winner says there’s “no excuse” and should be “no tolerance” for “anyone who thinks or expresses any kind of anti-Semitic remark.”

In a statement, his second since being arrested for drunk driving last Friday, Gibson maintained, “I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot. Hatred of any kind goes against my faith.”

The comments come after Gibson was accused of going off on a rant against Jews during the arrest – he was clocked going 140 km/h in a 70km/h zone.

The entertainment news website TMZ reported that Gibson said, “The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world,” and asked the arresting officer, “Are you a Jew?”

The actor, who’s a strongly conservative Catholic and whose father denies the Holocaust, first apologized for the incident Saturday calling what he said and did “despicable.” He didn’t go into detail about what he said however.

 

According to Gibson’s publicist, the actor has entered rehabilitation for alcohol abuse treatment.

“I want to apologize specifically to everyone in the Jewish community for the vitriolic and harmful words that I said to a law enforcement officer the night I was arrested on a DUI charge,” Gibson went on to say in the most recent statement.

He apparently wants to meet with representatives from the Jewish community for one-on-one talks in what he considers “the appropriate path for healing.”

The fallout from the incident continues, as ABC has reportedly decided to drop a miniseries it was developing with the actor’s production company.

 

Meanwhile, James Mee, the Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who arrested Gibson, and who happens to be Jewish, said he didn’t take Gibson’s comments seriously.

“That stuff is booze talking,” the deputy said. “There’s two things that booze does. It amplifies your basic personality. If you are a laid-back kind of person, just an easygoing kind of person, booze is going to amplify that and you’ll be just sitting around going how it’s a wonderful day.

“But, if you are a high-strung person, it’s going to amplify that, and all the bad things are going to come out.”

Gibson, 50, won a best-director Oscar for Braveheart in 1995, and has starred in dozens of films including Signs, What Women Want, and the Lethal Weapon and Mad Max franchises.

 

Mel Gibson’s statement, released to the news media early Tuesday, five days after his drunken driving arrest in Malibu:

There is no excuse, nor should there be any tolerance, for anyone who thinks or expresses any kind of anti-Semitic remark. I want to apologize specifically to everyone in the Jewish community for the vitriolic and harmful words that I said to a law enforcement officer the night I was arrested on a DUI charge.

I am a public person, and when I say something, either articulated and thought out, or blurted out in a moment of insanity, my words carry weight in the public arena. As a result, I must assume personal responsibility for my words and apologize directly to those who have been hurt and offended by those words.

The tenets of what I profess to believe necessitate that I exercise charity and tolerance as a way of life. Every human being is God’s child, and if I wish to honour my God I have to honour his children. But please know from my heart that I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot. Hatred of any kind goes against my faith.

I’m not just asking for forgiveness. I would like to take it one step further, and meet with leaders in the Jewish community, with whom I can have a one on one discussion to discern the appropriate path for healing.

I have begun an ongoing program of recovery and what I am now realizing is that I cannot do it alone. I am in the process of understanding where those vicious words came from during that drunken display, and I am asking the Jewish community, whom I have personally offended, to help me on my journey through recovery. Again, I am reaching out to the Jewish community for its help. I know there will be many in that community who will want nothing to do with me, and that would be understandable. But I pray that that door is not forever closed.

This is not about a film. Nor is it about artistic licence. This is about real life and recognizing the consequences hurtful words can have. It’s about existing in harmony in a world that seems to have gone mad.