Halle Berry pushes back against 'backyard' paps

Halle Berry says a paparazzi photographer went too far to get a shot of the actress holding her infant daughter, trespassing onto her private property and snapping them hanging out in the backyard.

The Oscar-winning actress was upset when pictures of her holding four-month-old Nahla Ariela Aubry showed up on the Internet and in two celebrity magazines. In a statement, Berry disputes the notion that the photos were taken when she was "out and about in Los Angeles."

Evan Spiegel, an attorney representing Berry, said a criminal complaint has been filed and an investigation is under way. He said there are witnesses who saw the photographers in the middle of a "very blatant and invasive trespass."

A person who answered the phone Friday at Fame Pictures, the agency that distributed the photos, said he had no immediate comment.

Besides pursuing criminal charges against the photographer, Berry is seeking to get the photos removed from the Web. In her statement to The Associated Press, Berry said she will never sell pictures of her children.

"I have long since come to terms with the fact that choosing a career as an actress has made me a public figure, but my baby has made no such choice, and unless and until she does, I will do everything I can ... to keep her out of the public eye," the statement read.

The photos, some of which have blurred leaves in the foreground, show Berry holding her daughter, standing near a table in what appears to be a private backyard. Berry's mother is also in some of the pictures.

Berry said she wants anyone who used the photos to know they were illegally obtained.

In Touch Weekly and Life & Style Weekly both published the photos in editions that landed on newsstands this week.

"In Touch Weekly and Life & Style Weekly licensed the photograph of Halle Berry and her baby from an established photo agency. The magazines are not aware that there was anything improper in the taking of this image," a spokesperson for the magazines' publisher, Bauer Publications, wrote in an e-mail.

Berry gave birth to Nahla, her first child, in March. Nahla's father, model Gabriel Aubry, was not seen in the photos.

Via associatedpress