Vanilla Ice Cooling in Jail

Rapper turned jack-of-all-reality-TV trades locked up in Palm Beach after allegedly roughing up his wife

By Natalie Finn Apr 11, 2008 5:37 AMTags

No one would call Vanilla Ice a heavy hitter anymore except for, perhaps, his wife. 

The circa-1990 rapper is cooling his heels in Palm Beach County Jail after being arrested Thursday for allegedly smacking his wife around. 

Robert Van Winkle—Vanilla Ice's real name—was booked at 10:43 p.m. ET on a single count of simple domestic battery after wife Laura Van Winkle called the cops to report that her husband was hitting and kicking her, police confirmed to E! News. 

Deputies arrived at their Florida home around 7:15 p.m. and tracked down Van Winkle on his motorcycle about two blocks away from the house. 

Per the arrest report, Laura appeared uninjured and—contrary to what she said at first—told the deputies on site that Van Winkle had pushed her. 

"He started yelling at me for going out to buy a bedroom set, in front of my daughter," she said, per the report. "I'm sorry, I can't say any more until I talk to an attorney." 

Van Winkle, meanwhile, told police that his missus is bipolar and, despite being on medication, tends to get irrational and argumentative, according to the police report. Before the cops arrived, she had thrown a picture frame off of their balcony to the ground below, where it shattered near their 8- and 10-year-old children, he said. 

He didn't push Laura, he added, and had only hopped on his motorcycle to get away from her, not the cops. 

A Palm Beach County Sheriff's spokesperson said the Cool as Ice star would be spending the night in jail before appearing in court in the morning, the usual protocol for suspected domestic violence cases. 

A not altogether unfamiliar scenario to Van Winkle.

The Surreal Life and Celebrity Boxing veteran was locked up in 2001 near Davie, Fla., after allegedly grabbing his wife's hair and putting his hand over her mouth during a spat that turned violent while the couple were in the car together, and then again in 2004 in Broward County, Fla., according to the Post.