N.Y. Police Arrest Courtney Love on Assault Charge



NEW YORK - Rocker Courtney Love was arrested in New York early on Thursday after throwing a microphone stand into a nightclub audience and hitting a man on the head, police said.





Hours before her arrest, Love, 39, known for her sensational, erratic behavior, bared her breasts on the CBS "Late Show with David Letterman."



A police spokesman said Love was charged with assault and reckless endangerment after the 2:30 a.m. incident at an East Village nightclub. She was scheduled to appear in Manhattan criminal court on April 19, prosecutors said.



She threw a microphone stand into the audience and a 24-year-old man was injured in the head, police said. The name of the man was not released.



The arrest came hours after a burst of outlandish behavior on Letterman's show. Walking onto the set singing "Danny Boy," Love jumped up on Letterman's desk and, with her back to the audience, declared, "Oh, Drew, you've had it," and pulled up her blouse. She was not wearing a bra. Her exposed skin was pixilated by the camera for TV viewers.



Actress Drew Barrymore famously performed a similar stunt on Letterman's show for his 48th birthday on April 12, 1995.



"Thank you very much. That's very sweet of you," Letterman said to Love, laughing. "They're gonna lose their liquor license."



"You know, I haven't shown my boobs in so long," she said after climbing down from his desk. When he tried to ask about the drug possession charges pending against her in California, she turned around and flashed Letterman again.



At one point during the rambling and sometimes incoherent interview that followed, Love started to pull her shirt up again facing the camera as Letterman pressed her about her legal troubles.



When Letterman asked, "Are things going well, or not?" she replied, "Yeh, they're going great! Handcuffed in the bedroom, handcuffed outside, doesn't matter." Later she joked, "I used to be a porno star" and asked Letterman, "Do you think I'm, like, whacky and stuff?"



"Are you whacky?" he asked her back.



"OK, but is that against the law?" she said.



"No, it's not against the law. It's not a good idea, but it's not illegal," Letterman said.



While performing a song from her new album, "America's Sweetheart," Love took off her guitar and hurled it across the stage.



Love, frontwoman for the defunct rock band Hole and widow of Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain, had appeared in court in Beverly Hills, California, on Tuesday for a hearing to determine if she will be tried on drug charges. The hearing was postponed but not before she had disrupted proceedings and was admonished by the judge to keep quiet.



Love has pleaded not guilty to illegal possession of the prescription painkillers oxycodone and hydrocodone. The charges stem from Love's Oct. 2 trip to a local hospital for what police called "a medical emergency."



Asked on TV Wednesday night by Letterman if drugs were involved in her arrest, Love replied, "Yeh, one expired Percocet and one Ambien." Percocet is a narcotic analgesic that contains oxycodone. Ambien is used to treat insomnia.



She faces two charges in a separate case stemming from her pre-dawn arrest the same day outside a boyfriend's home, where police said she was breaking windows.



Love was set to play another Manhattan concert on Thursday to promote her solo album "America's Sweetheart."