At 16, Mark Wahlberg approached a middle-aged Vietnamese man named Thanh Lam on the street and, using a large wooden stick, knocked him unconscious while calling him "VIETNAM fukkING shyt".
[12][13] That same day Wahlberg also attacked a second Vietnamese man named Hoa "Johnny" Trinh, punching him in the face. He believed he had left his victim permanently blind in one eye.
[11][12][14] Trinh was interviewed in December 2014 by the
Daily Mail, who revealed that he had already lost his eye during the
Vietnam War, was not severely injured by Wahlberg, and did not know the identity of his assailant prior to being contacted by the media.
[15] According to court documents regarding these crimes, when Wahlberg was arrested later that night and returned to the scene of the first assault, he stated to police officers: "You don't have to let him identify me, I'll tell you now that's the motherfukker who's (sic) head I split open."
[14] Investigators also noted that Wahlberg "made numerous unsolicited racial statements about '
gooks' and 'slant-eyed gooks'."
[12][14]
For these crimes, Wahlberg was charged with
attempted murder, pleaded guilty to
assault and was sentenced to two years in
Suffolk County Deer Island House of Correction.
He ultimately served only 45 days of his sentence.
[12][16] In another incident, the 21-year-old Wahlberg fractured the jaw of a neighbor in an unprovoked attack.
[17] Commenting in 2006 on his past crimes, Wahlberg has stated: "I did a lot of things that I regret, and I have certainly paid for my mistakes." He said the right thing to do would be to try to find the blinded man and make amends, and admitted he has not done so, but added that he was no longer burdened by guilt: "You have to go and ask for forgiveness and it wasn't until I really started doing good and doing right by other people, as well as myself, that I really started to feel that guilt go away. So I don't have a problem going to sleep at night. I feel good when I wake up in the morning."
[16]