Gibson Had Deal to Buy Tapes From Ex

Over a month before the tapes of Mel Gibson’s rants against his ex-girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva became an Internet sensation, the two had a signed contract to destroy them. After a two-day mediation in May, Gibson agreed to pay Grigorieva and their daughter roughly $15 million, provided she "turn over all 'evidence', and represent and warrant that all evidence has been turned over and all evidence will be destroyed in a manner agreed upon by both parties"—and that includes audio tapes. But once it came to signing a longer agreement detailing the specifics, she balked. The first contract is now at the center of an L.A. County Sheriff's Department investigation into Gibson’s claims of extortion. The first deal provided for, among other things, $1 million when Grigorieva handed over the evidence and payments of $10,000 per month for 18 years beginning in 2011.