On December 7th, David Beckham and an unnamed bodyguard got into an altercation with a paparazzo. Da Mata, the photographer, was following Posh and Becks in a car before Beckham and his bodyguard harassed Da Mata, throwing his camera into a trashcan and beating him up.

Per the suit, [the bodyguard’s] “oppressive and despicable” actions included grabbing the plaintiff’s camera and throwing it in a trash can, and then “violently” beating him when he got out of his car to retrieve it.

An eyewitness told E! News at the time that Da Mata had been trailing Beckham and wife Victoria when the Brit got out of his car and approached the paparazzo’s vehicle, enticing him to come out. Per our source, when Da Mata refused to budge, Beckham’s muscle went around to the passenger side and started throwing punches.

“They just can’t do this,” Da Mata said. “They put me on the floor, they got my camera, and they threw it in the trash can. They can’t do this to us.”

A police report was taken at the scene, but no criminal charges were ever filed in the incident.

Da Mata is claiming assault and battery, negligence, negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress and conversion. He is seeking unspecified damages.

[from E!]

It’s never fun getting beaten up by a professionally trained bodyguard, but we don’t have the full story here. How close was Da Mata “trailing” the Beckhams? Had he been trying to cut them off? Was he following at an unsafe speed? It can get irritating when celebrities complain incessantly about the paparazzi, and most stars who throw fits in front of the cameras are laughed at rather than pitied. But there’s a difference between getting a good photograph and putting a celebrity in danger for the perfect shot. Still, that doesn’t mean that it’s up to the star to take the law into their own hands.

It may turn out that David was just in an irritable mood that day and the bodyguard was just following his boss’ lead, but we won’t know until it goes to court – if the Beckhams don’t settle out of court. They’ve certainly got a lot in the bank after those joint Armani ads.

Here’s David Beckham playing football for Milan in Dubai on 1/6/09 and in Milan on 1/17/09. Credit: WENN