California Prosecutors Won’t Charge Mike Tyson In Plane Altercation

It was a video that went viral last month, as former undisputed heavyweight champ Mike Tyson was seen repeatedly punching another passenger on a San Francisco plane before it left the gate. But, on Tuesday afternoon Northern California authorities announced that they have closed their investigation and won’t file any charges against Tyson or the passenger involved.

TMZ Sports, which broke the story and had the video first, reported that the San Mateo County D.A. had reviewed the video and the evidence and won’t be proceeding,

Mike Tyson will NOT face criminal charges stemming from his airplane beatdown, TMZ Sports has learned. https://t.co/Yxc2btCl1P

— TMZ Sports (@TMZ_Sports) May 11, 2022

From TMZ’s item,

“Stephen Wagstaffe, the San Mateo County D.A., tells us ultimately neither Tyson nor the man wanted to go to court over it all. Wagstaffe added that they believed there were more serious cases his office should be prosecuting regardless.

“We thank San Mateo District Attorney Stephen Wagstaffe, the San Mateo County Sheriff, and all law enforcement agencies involved in this investigation for their careful, diligent, and professional work,” said Tyson’s attorneys, David Z. Chesnoff, Richard A. Schonfeld and Martin A. Sabelli.”

As we wrote previously, Tyson got into the scuffle and eventually punched the other passenger numerous times on plane in April that had not yet left for a flight to Florida.

The 55 year old Tyson was seen in digital still photos interacting with a young white adult seated in his section of a Jet Blue Airlines flight. According to a witness that TMZ got the info and presumably the video from, things turned violent when that same passenger refused to leave Tyson alone. Tyson’s attorneys later maintained that the passenger had thrown a water bottle at Tyson just before the video began.

That passenger seen in the videos bothering Tyson and then, taking punches from him was later identified as Melvin Townsend. He’s a 36 year old, who’s actually been in and out of prison in Florida for various charges including fraud and theft. The San Mateo D.A. will also decline to prosecute him, as well.

Tyson later took a different plane to Florida and has yet to publicly comment on the incident with the other person.