AceShowbiz -

Sean Penn's son, Hopper Penn, apologizes after he verbally attacked an African-American paparazzo from Splash News using racial and homophobic slur during a run-in in Beverly Hills on Tuesday, March 26. Sean's son with actress Robin Wright Penn reportedly went into argument with the photographer when he lost his temper and used the epithet.

"I was accosted by paparazzi and made to feel like an animal - threatened and under attack, but that does not condone my own actions. I deeply regret my choice of words," Hopper told TMZ.

The incident happened when Hopper accompanied his father to a medical office building. Sean entered the building first, with paparazzi taking pictures around him. Hopper followed shortly, wearing jeans and a black hoodie covering his head. When he got into argument with the African-American paparazzo, the run-in was recorded in a video.

"You f**king kidding me?" Hopper said in the video. The photographer scolded him. Then, the argument got heated because the youngster called the man "f****t" and "f**king n***er." The police who were nearby heard the commotion and asked what happened to the photographer who said that they were having an argument. The people involved did not want to take this matter any further.

Hopper's dad previously had some notorious incidents involving paparazzi. Sean once dangled a paparazzo by his ankles from his 9th-floor hotel room in Macau. At that time, Sean claimed that he thought the man was a burglar. Later in 2009, he got three years of probation and 36 hours of anger management counseling after kicking a paparazzo and breaking his camera.