(Reuters) -The U.S. Justice Department will allow actor Mel Gibson to own guns again, despite his 2011 conviction on a domestic violence charge, the New York Times reported on Thursday.
The Times, citing unnamed sources familiar with the Justice Department decision, reported that Gibson, a strong supporter of President Donald Trump, was among nine other people whose right to own a gun would be restored. Their names will soon be published in the Federal Register.
Federal law bars most people convicted of domestic abuse from owning a firearm.
Gibson was sentenced by a California judge to three years of probation 14 years ago on a misdemeanor charge for hitting his then girlfriend. Gibson pleaded no contest to the charge as part of a plea deal to avoid jail time.
A representative for Gibson said he had no immediate comment. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The White House directed a request for comment to the Justice Department.
The Times reported that the issue over Gibson’s gun rights caused strife within the Justice Department because Elizabeth Oyer, a pardon attorney for the department, had last month refused to agree to restore the actor’s right to own a gun. She was fired the next day.
Oyer, in an interview with the Times, said she had been told by a senior Justice Department leader that Gibson’s right to own a weapon should be restored based on the fact that he had a personal relationship with the president.
Oyer said her refusal to agree was not a political decision, but based on her not having done a background investigation into Gibson’s case and because she considered a domestic violence conviction to be extremely worrying.
Trump, a few days before his inauguration in January, named Gibson, along with the actors Sylvester Stallone and Jon Voight, as “special ambassadors” to Hollywood.
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Colorado; Editing by Don Durfee, Sonali Paul and Tom Hogue)
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