Gary Oldman's Son Defends Him Amid Domestic Violence Allegations 

Gary Oldman\'s Son Defends Him on Domestic Abuse Allegation: \'It Didn\'t Happen\'

Gary Oldman’s son is coming to his father’s defense after the Oscar winner’s ex-wife resurfaced her claims of spousal abuse.

star’s 20-year-old son, issued a lengthy statement that slammed “clickbait journalism” and his mother, former model Donya Fiorentino, for perpetuating an alleged domestic violence incident that he says never happened.

“I can see how coming out with a statement to combat an allegation must look. However, I was there at the time of the ‘incident,’ so I’d like to make this radiantly clear: it didn’t happen. Anyone who says it did is lying,” Gulliver said in a statement, in which he also claimed to be a supporter of the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements.

resurfaced an interview with his mother, referenced in Gulliver’s statement, in which she called her four-year marriage to Oldman a “nightmare.”

Fiorentino also spoke to TMZ after her ex-husband won the Best Actor Oscar on Sunday. “I thought we had evolved. What happened to the #MeToo movement?” she said.

Not long after Oldman and Florentino separated in 2001, the former model filed court documents accusing the actor of assaulting her in front of their two children, Gulliver and his younger brother Charlie, 19.

Oldman called the accusations “replete with lies, innuendoes and half-truths.” In later court filings obtained by PEOPLE, the actor stated that her “false allegations of spousal abuse … were rejected by the City Attorney’s Office, the District Attorney’s office and this court.”

The actor was granted primary custody of both their children, with supervised visits for Fiorentino, as the custody fight dragged out in court for years. According to a ruling obtained by PEOPLE, the court required that monitors “be advised” of Fiorentino’s “history including, but not limited to drug abuse and disparaging comments about” Oldman.

“It has been troubling and painful to see that these false allegations against my father being written about again, especially after this was all settled years ago,” Oldman’s son said in his statement.

Gulliver cited the fact that his father was awarded custody as proof of his innocence. “Custody of children is not given to a wife beater, and under most circumstances, hardly ever a man. My having lived, full time with my father should be in itself, proof enough,” he wrote.

“My Father is my one and true guiding light. My only hero. He is the man I aspire one day to become. If I could only become even half as great and half as pure. I was granted the good graces of his fatherhood as a child to be raised by him and only him. For that I am eternally grateful every hour of every day. I owe him the world and I owe him my life,” he added.

Gulliver noted that although he has not spoken to his mother in seven years, he does not wish to speak ill of her. “She has been a sad and very troubled person most of her life. Yes, she brought me into this world. She didn’t however, teach me how to be a part of it,” he explained.

He concluded his statement saying, “I want only to protect my father’s character, as a person and as an actor. I know he is a wonderfully kind man, gifted beyond belief, a man who wouldn’t trade anything for the love and happiness of his family. This torment should have ended 16 years ago. In such a momentous year for his career, my father should finally be able to enjoy himself. I hope that we can please make that a possibility.”

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