Wednesday, 7 January 2009

Charges against Josh Brolin dropped

Actor cleared of involvement in bar fight

Josh Brolin stars in No Country For Old Men and the movie W

Josh Brolin and Jeffrey Wright can breathe easier: prosecutors have dropped all charges against the two actors, who were allegedly involved in a barroom brawl in Louisiana last summer, says an attorney for Brolin and Wright.

On July 12, while shooting Oliver Stone's biopic W, Brolin, Wright and five members of the film's crew were arrested on misdemeanor charges – including interfering with police officers – at the Stray Cat Club, where the fight reportedly broke out.

Los Angeles attorney Blair Berk, who represented all seven of the implicated parties, says prosecutors in Shreveport have agreed to drop all charges against the group within 60 days, the Associated Press reports.

In a statement released by his publicist on Tuesday, Wright said: "These arrests should never have happened. Thankfully the prosecution was able to see that and dismiss all charges. Unfortunately, there are no winners here, but I remain hopeful that Shreveport officials will be encouraged to dig at the root causes of certain police incidents down there. An old-fashioned refusal of service led to our arrest that night, and there's no room for that in America in 2009."

Brolin, 40, currently can be seen opposite Sean Penn in Milk. Wright, 43, plays CIA agent Felix Leiter in the 007 caper Quantum of Solace and Muddy Water in Cadillac Records.