Canadian pop star Justin Bieber, who has been in trouble with the law in recent months, got two years of probation in Los Angeles Wednesday over an egg-throwing attack.
The teen idol did not appear in court. His attorneys entered a no contest plea on his behalf on a single misdemeanour vandalism charge before Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Leland Harris.
In addition to the probation, the singer was ordered to complete five days of community service and an anger management program.
He must also reimburse $80 900 of repairs performed on the home of his neighbour in the upscale neighbourhood of Calabasas, where many celebrities live. And the singer was ordered to stay away from the neighbour and his family for two years.
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Assistant District Attorney Alan Yochelson said Bieber’s prank was an “extremely immature and silly act.”
Another hearing was set for August 12.
Egg in his face:
Police had said soon after the attack they would be investigating felony charges against Bieber.
The January incident was just one in a long line of controversial headlines which have tarnished the once clean-cut image of Bieber, who has sold more than 12 million albums since emerging on the music scene in 2009 as a schoolboy sensation.
The 20-year-old star is also facing charges in Florida over an illegal street race in his Lamborghini in Miami Beach on 23 January.
He has pleaded not guilty to driving under the influence of substances, resisting arrest and driving with an expired license.
And in Canada, he is accused of assaulting a limousine driver last year.
Toronto police have accused Bieber of hitting a limousine driver “several times” over the back of the head. The car had picked him and five others up from a nightclub in the city in the early hours of December 30.
In April, Bieber misstepped into a bitter fight over history by visiting a controversial war shrine in Tokyo.
The troubled Canadian pop prince posted a snap of himself at Yasukuni shrine on his Instagram account — tweeting the link to his 51 million Twitter followers — with the message “Thank you for your blessings.”
The shrine is seen across Asia as a symbol of Japan’s perceived lack of penitence for its imperialist past.
An attached museum peddles a view of World War II deemed unpalatable by most mainstream historians, casting Japan as a victim and a frustrated liberator of Asia.
A storm erupted across social media after the posting, with fans lambasting the star for historical ignorance, and even China’s foreign ministry suggesting the young singer should educate himself on the issue.
That backlash recalled Bieber’s visit to the Anne Frank museum in Amsterdam a year earlier, when he sparked a furor with a message in the guest book at the house of the Jewish teenager, who died in a World War II concentration camp.
“Truly inspiring to be able to come here. Anne was a great girl. Hopefully she would have been a belieber,” he wrote. “Beliebers” are the nickname given to the singer’s legions of fans, many of whom are pre-teen girls.