Ronnie’s boardwalk antics may prove to have a lasting effect far larger than anyone could have ever imagined.
Jersey Shore‘s biggest fighter got himself into more than a few scrapes during season one. Whether he was trying to diffuse a man taunting him and Sammi as they walked home and then escalating to an all-out smack down with the man, pushing Sammi away prior to the fight, or protecting Snooki’s honor by taking a guy down in “one shot!” No one can deny that he seemed to be looking for something more physical than even Pauly D and the Situation were when they were creeping it on women at Karma.
Last week, TMZ broke the news that Ronnie’s first fight was fueled with his own homophobic taunts, and now his second fight is coming back to bite him big time.
In the penultimate season one JS episode the entire cast decided to go out for one final fist pump together and Snooki got all dressed up in what some onlookers described as a Halloween costume. The pink and black corset-type dress propped certain parts of her anatomy up, and left little to the imagination, which seemed to invite others to give her their opinion on how she dressed. A few groups of people even followed the cast as they walked home, which everyone tried to ignore – except for Ronnie. Ronnie doubled back behind the group and popped one of the guys following them, knocking him out cold.
MTV made no bones about broadcasting the man face down in the street as Ronnie taunted onlookers with “That’s One Shot! That’s One Shot Kid!”
Police responded to the incident and Ronnie spent the night in jail before being charged with aggravated assault.
Now, the victim, Stephen Izzo Jr., is saying that it’s not right that Ronnie gets to profit off of this criminal behavior and wants a judge to bar the release of Season One on DVD. He also is seeking to bar Ronnie from receiving further payments for his role on the show.
It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out. One the one hand, the judge may throw the case out or examine how MTV handled showing Izzo laying face down on the ground and bar that scene from being included but giving the green light to the rest of the season. After all, Ronnie isn’t the only person on the DVDs. On the other hand, this could put a glitch in the MTV system as they try to market season one to keep demand for the JS-ers high while they head into filming season two.
Our money is on the former, however, as the DVD is being released tomorrow – you can grab your copy for only $16.76 here. According to Pauly D, he, The Situation and Snooki are adding commentary to it today (anyone else think that might be getting down to the wire a bit?).
We’ll keep you posted on what happens with Mr. Izzo’s case and Ronnie’s court appearances for aggravated assault (even though he claims the charges have been dropped, the state of New Jersey doesn’t think so).