On December 28 1988, Madonna filed assault charges against Sean Penn at the sheriff’s office in Malibu, California.

Versions of what happened on that date include:

• Sean scaled the wall surrounding their Malibu home and started a quarrel with Madonna in their bedroom
• Madonna threatened to leave the house
• Sean attempted to tie Madonna to a chair with the cord from a lamp, but she fled the bedroom
• Sean chased Madonna into living room and then tied her to a chair using twine
• Sean threatened to cut off her hair
• The police report indicates that Sean was “drinking liquor straight from the bottle” and that the abuse went on for several hours, according to Madonna
• Madonna was smacked several times while bound to the chair
• Sean eventually untied Madonna and she fled the house in her car and drove to the sheriff’s office

When she arrived at the sheriff’s office, Lieutenant Bill McSweeny is quoted as saying, “I hardly recognized her as Madonna. She was weeping, her lip was bleeding and she had obviously been struck.”

Sean was charged with inflicting “corporal injury and traumatic conditions” on Madonna as well as committing “battery”.

Madonna filed for divorce a few days later and withdrew the assault charges against Sean.

On December 17 2015, Madonna made this statement about the above mentioned rumours/speculation:

“I am aware of the allegations that have surfaced over the years accusing Sean of incidents of physical assault and abuse against me, which purportedly resulted in Sean’s arrest for domestic assault and battery against me. Sean has never struck me, ‘tied me up,’ or physically assaulted me, and any report to the contrary is completely outrageous, malicious, reckless and false.”

Our luck is running out of time
You’re not in love with me anymore
I wish that it would change, but it won’t, if you don’t
Our luck is running out of time
You’re not in love with me anymore
I wish that it would change, but it won’t
‘Cause you don’t love me no more

You need so much but not from me
Turn your back in my hour of need
Something’s wrong but you pretend you don’t see
I think I interrupt your life
When you laugh it cuts me just like a knife
I’m not your friend, I’m just your little wife

They never laugh, not like before
She takes the keys, he breaks the door
She cannot stay here anymore
He’s not in love with her anymore

The bruises they will fade away
You hit so hard with the things you say
I will not stay to watch your hate as it grows
You’re not in love with someone else
You don’t even love yourself
Still I wish you’d ask me not to go

He takes a drink, she goes inside
He starts to scream, the vases fly
He wishes that she wouldn’t cry
He’s not in move with her anymore

He makes demands, she draws the line
He starts the fight, she starts the lie
But what is truth when something dies
He’s not in love with her anymore

You’re not in love with someone else
You don’t even love yourself
Still I wish you’d ask me not to go

She’s had enough, she says the end
But she’ll come back, she knows it then
A chance to start it all again
Till death do us part