Beach Bums Charged With Battery

Justice has been a long time coming in the case of June's brawl on the beach between the paps and the surfers - but after the D.A.'s office brought charges against the pap-bashers yesterday afternoon, we're one step closer!

The AP reports that Skylar Peak and Philip Hildebrand, two of the surfers, have been charged with misdemeanor battery for their part in the brawl, allegedly throwing a photographer and his camera into the water after he ignored their demands that he leave.

Howard Bragman, Peak's publicist (WTF? Since when do surfers need publicists?) responded to the charges by claiming that he and his client believe that "a complete investigation, including looking at the tapes, will show that Skylar defended himself." (A working phone number could not be located for Hildebrand.)

Charges have been slow in coming against the beach bums due to a lack of cooperative witnesses - but yesterday, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles district attorney's office said prosecutors finally felt they had enough evidence to pursue justice. Not that they need much more evidence beyond our video of the incident:









Shortly after the brawl went down, we spoke to plenty of folks who sided with X17, from Malibu natives to celebs like Dean Cain. (Seriously - even Superman's on our side here!) Meanwhile, even Matthew couldn't bring himself to stick up for his "defenders", staying silent when we asked him about the incident. Heck, the paps even staged a decidedly peaceful rally protesting their treatment at the surfers' hands - not exactly the kind of behavior you'd expect from folks alleged to have provoked a bunch of beach bums into beating them down!

Peak and Hildebrand will be arraigned in October. Better ride all the waves you can catch before then, guys - there's not a whole lot of surfing where you're going!