Actor Charlie Sheen spent much of Christmas Day in a cell after being accused of domestic violence.

Police arrested the 44-year-old Platoon and Wall Street star on Friday morning after an emergency call from a house in the ski resort of Aspen, Colorado.

An ambulance went to the house, but no-one was taken to hospital.

Police said the Two and a Half Men TV sitcom star was suspected of assault, menacing and criminal mischief. He was released on $8,500 (€6,500) bail.

Sheen is the son of actor Martin Sheen and brother of actor-director Emilio Estevez.

He was married in May 2008 to Brooke Mueller Sheen, a property investor who gave birth to the couple's first children, twin boys, in March.

Two and a Half Men has proven one of US TV's most popular sitcoms and made Charlie Sheen America's highest paid TV star in 2008, raking in $825,000 (€620,000) per episode.

It is not the actor's first brush with the law.

He was arrested in 1996 for assaulting a woman, who claimed she had been knocked unconscious at his home.

He was also the only star named as a client of 'Hollywood Madam' Heidi Fleiss, testifying at her trial that he had paid her $50,000.

Sheen ended up in hospital in 1998 following a drug overdose and checked into rehab on his release. Subsequently arrested for drinking and drug driving, he went back to rehab on doctor's orders.