Karate Kid and Cobra Kai actor Martin Kove was asked to leave a fan convention in Puyallup, Washington, over the weekend after he allegedly bit fellow Cobra Kai actor Alicia Hannah-Kim on her arm.
Hannah-Kim called police after Kove, allegedly unprovoked, grabbed Hannah-Kim’s arm and bit it as she passed by a meet-and-greet table at the convention, nearly drawing blood. He allegedly kissed her arm when she yelled out in pain, according to a police report obtained by TMZ. Deadline has confirmed the contents of the report.
Hannah-Kim and her husband, actor Sebastian Roche, who witnessed the alleged incident, say they told Kove immediately after what he did was completely unacceptable … and he allegedly “was furious and outraged and visibly angry when I told him calmly not to bite me … he insisted he bit me for fun,” according to the report.
Hannah-Kim opted not to press charges but requested an informational police report be taken, along with photos for the record for what police described as a “very noticeable bite mark on her arm that was already turning blue and bruising,” TMZ reports.
Police told Kove he needed to leave the venue after the report was filed.
Deadline has contacted representatives for Kove, Hannah-Kim and the Puyallup Police Department.
News of the incident at the event spread quickly among attendees, we are told. “It was all handled pretty quickly on site, and was over before you knew it,” an individual with knowledge of the events at Washington State Summer Con told Deadline today.
Kove and Hannah-Kim were part of a group of Cobra Kai talent attending Summer Con over the weekend. Mary Mouser, Tanner Buchanan, Rayna Vallandingham and Patrick Luwis also participated.
Kove played John Kreese, the temperamental sensei in the original three Karate Kid films, reprising the role in Netflix’s Cobra Kai alongside Ralph Macchio and William Zabka across the show’s six seasons. Hannah-Kim joined the Cobra Kai cast in Season 5 as South Korean sensei Kim Da-Eun, remaining with the cast for the remainder of the series.
