Wife Flees as He Rampages Through House : TV Interview Reportedly Enrages Tyson

Heavyweight champion Mike Tyson flew into a rage and hurled furniture through the windows of his mansion, forcing his wife and mother-in-law to flee, according to reports published today.

Tyson’s rage Sunday morning was sparked by an interview his wife, actress Robin Givens, and mother-in-law, Ruth Roper, had with Barbara Walters, which aired Friday on ABC’s “20-20,” said the New York Post and New York Daily News.

In the interview, Givens and Roper portrayed Tyson, 22, as a “scary” and “frightening” person to live with.

The Post said an outraged Tyson, who has said he is manic-depressive, hurled a sugar bowl, a fireplace andiron and chairs through the windows of his home in Bernardsville, N.J. The News said Tyson brandished “an instrument” from the fireplace and ran through the home smashing windows.

Persons suffering from manic-depression can alternate from normal to moods of abnormal excitability or mental depression. In the television interview last week, Tyson said he would not take medication for the ailment, which can be controlled by lithium carbonate and drugs.

Givens, a star of television’s “Head of the Class,” and Roper, both apparently unharmed, reportedly fled the house and drove several miles to a nearby gasoline station, where they first phoned a close friend, then phoned police.

According to the Post, Tyson stayed in the house for several minutes, then hopped into one of his cars and drove to New York City. Hours later, he phoned for a limousine to pick him up after he missed meeting a friend, the newspaper said.