Halle Berry‘s son is now at the center of a tense legal dispute between the actress and her ex-husband Olivier Martinez. The former couple’s 12-year-old son, Maceo, is reportedly the subject of abuse allegations that led a Los Angeles County judge to grant Martinez a temporary restraining order against Berry this week.
According to UsWeekly, Martinez, 60, filed for a domestic violence restraining order on Thursday, October 1, alleging that an incident took place between Berry and their son on September 26th. Martinez claimed Maceo called him asking to be picked up from Berry’s home because she allegedly “physically attacked him and choked him.”
“While on the phone with our son, I heard him panicking and heard [Berry] still yelling at him in the background,” Martinez alleged in the filing. He claimed that when he arrived to pick up Maceo, Berry “did not come out of the home,” but her partner reportedly helped carry the boy’s bags to the car. Martinez also claimed Berry texted him the next morning to apologize for what happened.
Martinez’s filing reportedly goes further, alleging this wasn’t an isolated event. PEOPLE Magazine reported that Martinez claimed Berry grabbed Maceo “by the neck and started choking him while shouting, ‘Who is dominant now?! Who is dominant?’” during the alleged September incident.
He also claimed Berry had previously put Maceo in physical restraints while training in mixed martial arts, and that their son allegedly told her he dislikes being brought into her training sessions, though Berry reportedly “downplayed the incidents.”
Martinez claimed Maceo once told him he wanted to get physical with his mother if it happened again, but that he discouraged his son from physically retaliating against his mother. “The way I was raised I believe that a physical fight between a mother and son should never happen, so I discouraged our son from escalating conflict with his mother to physical violence,” Martinez said in the filing, adding that Maceo allegedly “had to physically fight off his mother to escape” during the September incident. Martinez claimed his son no longer wants to spend time at Berry’s home and appears shaken from the incident.
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Olivier Martinez Does Not Intend To Remove Halle Berry’s Son From Her Life
In the filing, Martinez asked for a temporary “no contact order” in place of the exes’ standard 50-50 custody arrangement, along with a psychological evaluation and drug and alcohol screenings for Berry.
“I do not want to permanently sever the relationship between our son and [Berry] but I do not believe that they should be interacting with each other until [Berry] can take sufficient accountability for her actions,” he stated.
Berry’s attorney, Marina Beck, strongly denied the allegations in a statement. “To say this filing is entirely meritless and deliberately misleading would be an understatement,” Beck said. “There is voluminous evidence, including numerous judicial rulings, that Olivier Martinez repeatedly violated court orders and interfered with necessary therapeutic and educational interventions to the detriment of his and Halle Berry’s minor son Maceo, misconduct for which Mr. Martinez has already been legally sanctioned.” Beck added that Berry “is used to this kind of outrageous conduct from Mr. Martinez” and will not be deterred “from fighting for Maceo’s best interests.”
According to TMZ, Beck’s reference to Martinez’s history may point back to a 2012 Thanksgiving altercation between Martinez and Berry’s then-boyfriend, Gabriel Aubry, which also resulted in a restraining order at the time. Berry’s side denied Aubry’s version of that incident back then, claiming Aubry was the aggressor.
Though the restraining order was granted, the judge did not grant every request Martinez made. While the order requires Berry to stay 100 yards from Martinez, she has not been blocked from seeing Halle Berry’s son altogether. As PEOPLE reported, the judge temporarily modified Berry’s visitation to Mondays, Tuesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m., and declined to order sobriety monitoring, citing “insufficient information.”
Martinez’s attorney, Patrick Baghdaserians, described his client as “a loving parent” whose “paramount concern” is Maceo’s safety. “Our paramount concern right now is only one real issue, and that’s protecting this great kid,” he said.
Berry and Martinez married in 2013 and separated in 2015, finalizing their divorce in 2023 after a lengthy legal battle. A hearing to determine whether the restraining order becomes permanent is scheduled for October 16th.
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