Not his finest moments. While Mark Wahlberg has gained success throughout his career, he has faced his fair share of controversies.
The Boston native had his first run-in with the law as a teenager. In June 1986, Wahlberg and a group of friends were charged for chasing and throwing rocks at a group of Black children while yelling racial slurs at them. Two months later, a civil action suit was brought against the Ted star for the incident, but the case was settled in September of the same year.
Two years later, Wahlberg committed another hate crime when he assaulted two Vietnamese men and made derogatory comments about them. The Departed actor was charged with attempted murder and pleaded guilty to felony assault for the 1988 attack. At the time, Wahlberg claimed that he was intoxicated and that the attacks were not race related. Since he was previously charged with the civil rights offense, the Uncharted star was found to be in contempt of court and was sentenced to a two-year prison sentence. He served 45 days.
More than two decades later, Wahlberg sought out a pardon from the State of Massachusetts to have his teenage crime removed from his record.
“I am deeply sorry for the actions that I took on the night of April 8, 1988, as well as for any lasting damage that I may have caused the victims,” the Oscar nominee wrote in his 2014 pardon application. “Since that time, I have dedicated myself to becoming a better person and citizen so that I can be a role model to my children and others.”
News of Wahlberg seeking a pardon earned him some backlash and was opposed by an Asian-American activist group and victims of Wahlberg’s previous criminal incidents. The Fighter actor later revealed he regretted filing the paperwork.
“It was one of those things where it was just kind of presented to me, and if I could’ve done it over again I would never have focused on that or applied,” he recalled to The Wrap in September 2016. “I didn’t need that, I spent 28 years righting the wrong. I didn’t need a piece of paper to acknowledge it. I was kind of pushed into doing it, I certainly didn’t need to or want to relive that stuff over again.”
Wahlberg made headlines again in 2018 when he was reportedly paid 1,500 times more than his All the Money in the World costar Michelle Williams when they reshoot scenes for the film after recasting Kevin Spacey amid his sexual misconduct allegations. The Other Guys star earned $1.5 million while Williams received a measly $1,000. Following the controversy, Wahlberg donated his extra earnings to Time’s Up legal defense fund in Williams’ name.
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Keep scrolling to see Wahlberg’s most controversial moments over the years:
