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Who Really Gave Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino That Black Eye? His Mother!

Get the real scoop behind the Jersey Shore star's shiner

By Marc Malkin Jul 08, 2014 11:10 PMTags
Mike 'The Situation' SorrentinoLenny Abbot / Splash News

Remember that black eye that Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino was left with after he got into a fight last month with his brother Frank?

Well, everyone assumed Frank was the one who gave him the shiner.

Turns out it was their own mom, Linda, who popped him one.

Seriously!

"I'm going to let you in on a secret, mom is the one who got him," Mike and Frank's older brother Marc exclusively told me earlier today when I caught up with the family to chat about their new reality show, The Sorrentinos. "She got him with a left. Mom's the tough one."

Adam Larkey/ABC

"Yeah," Linda said. "I broke my finger. I just got it out of the sling."

Linda (who is so petite we wouldn't be surprised if one of Mike's biceps is bigger than her waistline) insists she didn't mean to hurt her son: "I was trying to break him and Frank up and I think I missed and…"

And then Mike ended up bruised and bloodied and in jail. The former Jersey Shore star was arrested after his June 17 fight with Frank at his new tanning salon, Boca Club Tanning. He posted $500 bail and released from behind bars after being charged with simple assault.

Mike claimed at the time that he wasn't happy with how Frank was running the salon.

But within days, Marc played peacemaker. "I try to remain calm in all these situations," he said. "At the end of the day, we are all family. Everybody has a brother or sister they fight with."

"Our fight just happened to make national headlines," Frank said. "Everyone was asking us if it was for the show, but it wasn't. We were wrapped already. There were no cameras filming it."

The Sorrentinos premieres on TVGN on Tuesday, July 15, at 10 p.m.