Rapper Foxy Brown charged with assault

Rapper Foxy Brown has been indicted on charges that she smacked a neighbour with a mobile phone, a Probation Department lawyer said today.

The lawyer, Matilda Leo, said the indictment, handed up in Brooklyn, New York, charges Brown with second and third degree assault, attempted second degree assault and criminal possession of a weapon – presumably the mobile phone.

In Manhattan, Leo told Criminal Court Judge Melissa Jackson about the indictment before a hearing on whether Brown, 28, violated terms of her probation.

Brown, whose real name is Inga Marchand, was on three years’ probation for attacking two manicurists at a Manhattan nail salon in August 2004. She has been accused of several probation violations, including an arrest after a February fight in a Florida hair salon.

Just before the hearing began Brown asked the judge for yet another chance at freedom and promised to straighten out her life.

“I’m willing to do whatever I need to do to change,” Brown told the judge. She said she had made a lot of mistakes before Jackson jailed her. “I realise that’s not where I want to be. It’s humbled me in ways I never imagined.”

The judge replied, “Ms Marchand, it’s too little, too late. I’m glad you’re learning something; that’s a positive.”

Jackson rejected a deal in which Brown would have gone to jail for nine months in exchange for a misdemeanour guilty plea. The judge said the defendant knew she would face a year in jail if she violated probation.

Leo read four violations the Probation Department filed against Brown. She said Brown had twice left New York without telling the court or Probation Department; that she had changed her address from Brooklyn to Mahwah, New Jersey, without permission; and that she had failed to tell the court she had received seven traffic summonses in New Jersey.

The hearing began with testimony from clinical psychologist Carol Friedland. She said Brown had stopped attending anger management sessions with her. The psychologist said she had tried but failed to contact Brown to learn why.

The hearing was to continue later in the day.