‘I was being playful in the moment but went too far and there is absolutely no excuse for my behaviour’
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Cobra Kai star Martin Kove has apologized to his co-star Alicia Hannah-Kim after he bit her at a fan event over the weekend.
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“I deeply regret and apologize for my actions regarding the incident with Alicia (Hannah-Kim), a genuinely kind and wonderful person who didn’t deserve to be put in this position,” Kove, 78, said in a statement obtained by Variety and Entertainment Weekly from Jaffe & Co. Crisis Management.
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“I’ve always respected her and considered her a highly professional and talented co-worker on Cobra Kai. I was being playful in the moment but went too far and there is absolutely no excuse for my behaviour. I regret my actions for which I take full responsibility for what I did, and again I apologize to her and her husband. I’m committed to learning from this and it will never happen again.”
According to a police report obtained by PEOPLE, USA Today and Variety, Hannah-Kim, 37, claimed Kove attacked her when they were both attending Summer Con in Puyallup, Wash.
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“Martin Kove suddenly grabbed her arm and bit her upper arm so hard it nearly drew blood, and she yelled out in pain,” the documents read. “Once Martin Kove finished biting her arm, he grabbed her arm again and began kissing it where he had bit her.”
When Hannah-Kim and her husband, French actor Sebastian Rochee, confronted him afterwards, Kove allegedly “exploded on them” and maintained “he did not do anything wrong.”
“I walked past Martin Kove, tapped him on the shoulder and said hello & he turned around grabbed my arm and BIT DOWN HARD almost drawing blood,” Hannah-Kim explained in a handwritten statement to police. “I yelped and drew back and then he grabbed my arm again to kiss it.”
When she saw that her arm showed “visible teeth marks,” Hannah-Kim tried to speak to Kove.
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“We approached Martin in the green room later (30 mins) and he was furious & outraged and visibly angry when I told him calmly not to bite me. He insisted he bit me for fun,” she continued in her statement.
The couple engaged with an on-site police officer, who saw that Hannah-Kim’s arm “was already turning blue and bruising.”
According to the report, Kove tried to brush off his behaviour as his attempt at being “funny,” and added that they “play fight all the time on the set of Cobra Kai.”
Hannah-Kim declined to press charges, but Kove was reportedly escorted out of the venue.
In the Karate Kid spinoff Cobra Kai, Kove reprised the villainous John Kreese character he played in three movies. Hannah-Kim appeared as sensei Kim Da-Eun, who is an ally of Kreese’s on the Netflix show.
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