Kaplan responds to Gimelstob comments

In the wake of the comments Justin Gimelstob has made over the last two days regarding the just-settled felony battery court case, Randall Kaplan issued the following statement through a spokesperson Wednesday.

Kaplan, 50, was the man Gimelstob attacked last Oct. 31, in the area of a kids’ Halloween party in their Brentwood, Calif. neighbourhood.

His victim impact statement, read during the final court proceeding Monday, described the attack and the physical fallout from it.

“Contrary to public statements from Mr. Gimelstob, in Monday’s court proceeding Judge Upinder Kalra called the Halloween assault ‘a violent, unprovoked attack in public in front of children’ – a decision that followed an investigation by the LAPD that included interviews of several witnesses to the attack,” the statement reads.

“Mr. Gimelstob’s contention that Mr. Kaplan provoked him by discussing the recent death of Mr. Gimelstob’s father is scurrilous and untruthful. Mr. Gimelstob ambushed Mr. Kaplan without warning from behind; only after the three-minute attack ended did Mr. Kaplan learn the identity of his attacker.

“And Mr. Kaplan did not know that Mr. Gimelstob’s father had died until the day following the attack, when a mutual friend informed Mr. Kaplan of this news.”

The statement follows the publication of an article on the TMZ website in which it was revealed that Gimelstob has filed a restraining order against Kaplan.