Los Angeles  - Movie star and director Mel Gibson has been cleared by police of claims that he assaulted a man who tried to take a picture of him in a nightclub.

The photographer, named as Karlis Gajevskis, posed as a fan and tried to snap a picture of the newly-divorced Gibson and his girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva at the opening of the Playhouse nightclub.

Security personnel repeatedly distanced him from the couple but the photographer filed an assault charge with police claiming that Gibson ripped his shirt.

Police quickly concluded however that he was making the story up, telling celebrity website TMZ. com that witnesses had seen him leaving the venue with his shirt intact. (dpa)