By Marty Graham
SAN DIEGO, May 8 (Reuters) – The former child actor who was
the voice of Charlie Brown in the 1960s “Peanuts” animated
television specials was sentenced to a year in jail on Wednesday
and immediately ordered to a residential drug treatment center
by a California judge who told him: “Don’t be a blockhead.”
Peter Robbins, 56, who choked up while reading a letter of
apology to the court, had pleaded guilty last month to two
felony counts of stalking and making criminal threats against
his girlfriend, Shawna Kern, and a plastic surgeon who had
performed her breast implant surgery.
Although he was sentenced to a year in jail, he was given
credit for time served and ordered to spend the next eight
months in a drug treatment facility. He will then serve five
years of probation.
“I realize this is the first step towards becoming the
fun-loving, respectful person I was and hope to be again,”
Robbins said in his apology. “I love Shawna and wish her my
best.”
Robbins was 9 years old in 1965 when he became the voice of
the world-weary yet optimistic title character of “A Charlie
Brown Christmas,” a holiday classic and the first of many
animated TV specials based on the popular “Peanuts” comic strip
by Charles Schulz.
The actor went on to voice Charlie Brown in “It’s the Great
Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” “You’re In Love, Charlie Brown” and “A
Boy Named Charlie Brown,” which aired in the 1960s. He was
replaced in later versions of the animated specials.
Charlie Brown was often called a blockhead by some of the
other characters on the show.
Robbins was arrested in January after a series of telephone
and in-person threats to the two women, Kern and Dr Lori Saltz.
Judge Dwayne Moring of San Diego Superior Court agreed that
Robbins be immediately sent to residential drug treatment from
the county jail, where he has been held in lieu of $550,000 bail
since January.
Robbins’ judgment had been affected by alcohol and
prescription drug addiction at the time of the crime, according
to the probation report.
(Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Eric Beech)
