David Justice is facing backlash after revealing the reason why his marriage to Halle Berry didn’t work out.
The former professional baseball player, 59, spoke out on the All the Smoke podcast about his marriage to the actress, 58, from 1993 to 1997.
‘She asked me to marry her after knowing me for five months,’ he reflected.
‘I don’t know if my heart was really into it. But I didn’t want to make her feel bad and say no. I was just in the moment, it caught me off-guard. We’re getting along, we’re vibing, again, we’re only five months in, we’re still in the honeymoon stage.’
He then shared that he ultimately decided to leave Berry because she didn;t cook and clean like his mother did, a comment that his earned disbelief and outrage online.
He said: ‘I’m looking at my mom, I’m a Midwest guy. So in my mind, I’m thinking a wife at that time should cook, clean, and I’m thinking OK, if we have kids, is this the woman I want to have kids with and build a family with? And at that time, as a young guy, she don’t cook, don’t clean, don’t really seem like motherly.’
He continued, saying: ‘Eventually, I realize this isn’t the person I wanted to spend my life with.’
X user @macaiyla wrote: ‘Men are so annoying ffs its never enough. You get a hard working woman and shes not motherly enough for you. You get a woman who stays at home and they’re useless golddiggers. There is no winning with this gender its like talking to a wall.’
@nwajiohaphilip agreed: ‘Sounds like he was looking for a housekeeper, not a partner.’
@_mstrdom posted: ‘Men are so annoying. They’re looking for their mother. We’re in 2025.’
But some people defended the regressive take, with X user @petaitoksf1 writing: ‘Well that’s his expectation and if she ain’t what he’s looking for then that explains why he’s the ex. Neither is wrong though.’
@AMB0915 agreed: ‘You’re allowed to have expectations, preferences etc but let that be known to the person you’re going to marry prior. And they don’t have to meet them if they don’t want to. Glad Halle berry is happy with someone else because services exist for the above.’
Continuing to reflect on the fallout after the end of his marriage to Berry, Justice said: ‘It wasn’t really a lot of negative attention until I decided to leave her in 1996.’
Despite Berry’s dissimilarities to his mother, Justice thinks the marriage could have been saved: ‘Honestly, we probably could have made it, if I knew about therapy,’ he said.
He continued: ‘It’s just that I, because I was young, had only been in honestly one real relationship before her. My knowledge and my understanding and my wisdom around relationships just wasn’t vast.’
Famously, Berry told People in 1996 that an ex-boyfriend punctured her eardrum while hitting her. At the time, many believed she was referring to Justice, something he always denied.
While Berry eventually set the record straight and publicly confirmed it wasn’t Justice, he resent she didn’t do it sooner, saying: ‘She let the world think it was me. I thought she was dead wrong for that.’
Still, Justice acknowledged he could have been more empathetic when splitting from Berry.
He said: ‘I look back on that situation, and I’m like, that girl really did love me. And I can see why she would be so mad at me. Because imagine if you really love somebody and they tell you they want to break up, and there’s nothing you can say to get them back. That had to have been tough on her.
Today, Berry shares her life with musician Van Hunt, her long-term partner.
Her romantic history includes two high-profile marriages to French actor Olivier Martinez from 2013 to 2016, and to singer Eric Benét between 2001 and 2005.
She is also a devoted mother of two: 17-year-old Nahla, whom she co-parents with ex-partner Gabriel Aubry, and 11-year-old Maceo, her son with Martinez.
Justice, meanwhile, has built a steady family life far from the headlines. He has been married to his wife, Rebecca, for 24 years, and together they are raising two children.
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