Chris Brown is being investigated by police after allegedly hitting a woman and stealing her phone during a party.
Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department says it responded to a report of battery on Saturday, 2nd January, outside a hotel room at the Palms Casino Resort, and met with a female victim “who appeared to have minor injuries”.
The victim, who has been named by TMZ as Liziane Gutierrez (pictured), attended a party in a hotel room and allegedly got into an argument with Brown when she tried to take a photo of him with her phone.
Police say Ms Gutierrez was allegedly hit by Brown, who took her phone and continued a verbal altercation with her as she was taken out of the room by Brown’s security detail.
Police say they attempted to speak to Brown in his hotel room but were not allowed inside. They believe he had left the hotel room by the time they arrived.
Ms Gutierrez has told TMZ that Brown hit her in the eye when she took a photo of him at the party, leaving her injured badly enough to visit hospital. She says Brown became furious because she had slipped the phone past his security guards.
Brown’s spokeswoman, Nicole Perna, has rubbished Gutierrez’s claims in a statement to TheWrap.
“Making false accusations seems to be a pattern of behaviour for Ms Gutierrez. Whatever her motives, her statements are unequivocally untrue,” Perna said.
“Ms Gutierrez was escorted out of the private after-party at the Palms Casino Resort for being disruptive and out of control.
“Once she was in the hallway, while waiting for Chris Brown’s security to bring out her phone, she had a total meltdown, throwing her purse to the ground and claiming she could ‘buy everyone in the hotel’.”
Perna called Gutierrez’s story a “complete fabrication”, wondered “what mood altering substances Ms Gutierrez was on” and suggested that her story was “a clear case of retaliation for her bruised ego”.
Brown was convicted of assaulting his former girlfriend Rihanna in 2009, and accepted a plea deal which included five years’ formal probation and a restraining order. His probation ended in March 2015.
Brown scheduled an Australian tour for December 2015, which was officially cancelled at the last minute after the Australian Government denied his visa on character grounds. Brown last toured the country in 2012.
For those needing assistance, 1800 Respect – the National Sexual Assault Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service – can be reached on 1800 737 732.
