Tyrese Gibson is in custody in Atlanta after a judge in a contentious child support hearing ordered him to pay his former partner more than $73,000 to avoid prison, court records show.
The actor appeared in Fulton County Superior Court for the latest hearing in his ongoing dispute with ex-wife Samantha Lee, with whom he has a daughter, Soraya. Gibson was ordered to pay $10,690 a month in child support in April 2023, but Judge Kevin Farmer held him in contempt of court for his failure to pay. Gibson was brought into court in handcuffs and then led away by a bailiff. TMZ first reported the news.
Farmer has the Fast and Furious Actor the opportunity to avoid jail time if he pays $73,525.73 within 48 hours, according to the arrest warrant he received The Hollywood Reporterr. That includes $7,500 in legal fees paid by Lee. According to TMZ, Gibson had been paying $2,200 a month in child support – just under 25 percent of the amount the court ordered in 2022 during another contentious hearing.
TMZ reports that Gibson is making preparations to pay the $73,525.73 and leave the Atlanta prison.
On Sunday, Gibson told his Instagram followers in a post that his arrest could be imminent. In it, he also attacked Farmer and complained about the fairness of family courts towards fathers.
“Samantha’s attorneys Adam Gleklen and William Alexander, who are best friends with Judge Kevin M. Farmer (collusion),” Gibson wrote in the now-deleted post.
“We are appealing all of his rulings and have already tried to remove this judge from office twice,” he added of Farmer on Sunday. “The second time we tried to remove him from office. (He actually denied his own motion to remove him from office) … imagine that???”
“It’s pretty clear they hate me but I have to remind them of anything and everything about my life and success. I’ve been working my ass off since I was 14 to get here,” he added. “#FamilyCourt is THE WORST THING to FATHERS.”
Gibson and Lee married in 2017. She filed for divorce in 2020 and the two later released a joint statement calling the separation “a painful and significant development in our lives.”
A 2022 hearing in which Farmer ordered Gibson to pay $10,690 a month in child support became controversial when the actor snapped at one of Lee’s lawyers after declaring that the Baby boy Star had earned $2 million the previous year. When Gibson began to ask Lee’s lawyer a question, Farmer snapped at him, threatened to find him in contempt of court, and then told him, “You don’t ask questions! That’s not how it works!!”
At that hearing, Farmer also told Gibson that monthly child support of $10,690 should have been paid since Lee filed for divorce in 2020, and ultimately ruled that he owed $169,000 in back payment.
In addition to his daughter with Lee, Gibson has a teenage daughter, Shayla, with his ex-wife Norma Mitchell.
Calls from The Hollywood Reporter to attorneys for Gibson, Lee and the Fulton County court were not returned Monday afternoon.
