Bad juju seems to follow Columbus Short like an annoying child.
In February, Short was charged with misdemeanor spousal battery, in April he was charged with aggravated assault and later that month he was fired form popular television Scandal. Talk about a bad couple of days.
After his most recent run in with the law, Short is not only opening up about his past unfortunate events, but also defending his actions. During an interview with Billy Bush of Access Hollywood, the actor speaks on his court troubles:
“The last three months, I have to say, have been one of the most trying times of my life. I think there’s a time when your personal life gets magnified by who we are as celebrities. I’ve always believed that the truth is good enough, like, sometimes the truth is ugly, right? And it’s good enough, but I think what happens in the media is they make grandiose versions of these stories. But I’m here to say today, that I’m still here, I’m focused, I’m grinding. Both of those two cases that you were speaking of earlier, those are dropped. So you know, one by one, it’s just like slowly but surely just chipping away at this thing.”
Short then went on to defended himself against his Fourth of July arrest, in which TMZ reported that the former Scandal star incited a fight at the Katy Trail Ice House in Dallas, Texas after hours of drinking and attempting to dine and dash. Reportedly, when the security guard stopped Short, the actor accused him of being racist and they began to fight. The 31-year-old tells the story differently.
“I was with a group of people that were eating, I went to the bathroom, I came back and there was an altercation ensuing when I came back. And me being [like] ‘Whoa, let’s break it up,’ it was a misunderstanding and I guess the cops thought I was someone involved in the situation. And then they grabbed me up, and by the time I was on the ground… I apologized to the officers later, [but] I said some pretty choice words [when] I was already in cuffs. But you know, by the end of it all, it all went away. It’s over, we’re moving forward and upward. One of those bad nights, it sucks.”
As far as the domestic violence charges, he’s denying everything.
“Me and my wife, we’re going through problems – serious problems. However, the domestic part of it, I’m not a physically violent man. I’ve never put my hands on a woman physically, I was raised by a woman.”
The story his wife, Tanee Short, tells a extremely different. She accused him of soaking her with wine, holding her down and forcing her to play “truth or truth,” a game where he welded a knife above her and threatened to stab her if she lied.
When asked about what would happen moving forward, Short answered, “The divorce is going forward, there is a restraining order that’s in effect. This thing is going to happen and it’s sad.”