New allegations surface about actor Mickey Rooney's final years

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Legendary actor Mickey Rooney died of heart attack aged 93 in April 2014
Since then feuding relatives have gone to war over remains of his fortune
Eldest stepson Chris previously accused brother Mark of abusing Rooney
But Mark has now hit back, saying Chris and wife Jan were the abusers
Mark, and others close to the family, say Jan physically abused Rooney while trying to exploit his fame to get herself in the limelight
Meanwhile, Mark says Chris persuaded Rooney to keep on performing so that he could spend the actor's money on fast cars and luxury homes
Chris and Jan have always denied all of the allegations against them

Published: 20:20 EST, 21 October 2015 | Updated: 01:42 EST, 22 October 2015

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It is no secret that, until his death in April last year, Hollywood legend Mickey Rooney had led a troubled life in his twilight years.

In 2011 he testified in the Senate about being the victim of elder abuse, shortly before his attorney took out a restraining order against stepson Chris Aber, and his wife, Christina.

Allegations that Rooney's eighth wife Jan had been physically abusing him surfaced shortly after his death, while Rooney's attorney also accused Chris of squandering the actor's fortune on fast cars and luxury homes.

However, in a new investigation by The Hollywood Reporter, Chris's younger brother Mark claims the abuse went further and was far more severe than previously reported.

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Mark Aber (front left), stepson of Mickey Rooney (center) by his eighth wife Jan (top right), alleges that his mother physically and mentally abused the actor, while older brother Chris (top left) siphoned off his money

Mark (far left) cared for Rooney in the final two years of his life after Rooney's attorney took out a restraining order against Chris (far right) amid allegations of elder abuse (Rooney and Jan pictured center)

According to Mark and others close to the family, Jan was desperate for fame and sought to get it by piggy-backing of Rooney's success, while secretly physically abusing him.

Robert Malcolm, one of Rooney's agents, told how Jan 'often insisted she autograph photographs handed to Rooney and leaned into photos with her husband'.

Previous images released of Rooney, from 2011 and 2012, show the actor with a black eye, missing tooth, and a nasty gash to his forehead.

While Rooney attributed these injuries to falling down stairs, and walking into a flat screen TV, Mark lays the blame with Jan.

Indeed, both Rooney and Jan have previously conceded to a tempestuous relationship in interviews, though Jan has always denied 'each and every allegation' of physical abuse.

Mark and his wife Charlene, who cared for Rooney during the final two years of his life, also allege that Chris lied to Rooney about the state of his finances in order to keep him working.

Mark says Chris then set himself up with access to all of Rooney's accounts, and began siphoning off his money while leaving the actor destitute, claims Chris denies.

Rooney's former agent Robert Malcolm said Jan (pictured with Rooney in 1978, left, and 2004, right) tried to advance her own fame by piggy-backing on that of her husband

Chris has previously claimed that Mark kept Jan and Rooney apart during the final years of the actor's life, keeping him a prisoner, but Mark now claims his brother and mother were the real abusers

Michael Augustine, an attorney appointed as Rooney's guardian after his restraining order against Chris and Christine, even attempted to sue Chris for $8.5million he allegedly stole from the actor.

The pair settled in 2013 for $2.8million, though the penalty was never enacted, and Chris has since shown Mail Online documents in which both parties agreed not to assign culpability.

Since Rooney's death, from a heart attack in April last year, Chris and Mark have been locked in a bitter legal struggle for the remains of the actor's estate, thought to be worth as little as $18,000.

Rooney's funeral was even delayed by several weeks while the family rowed over his final resting place, before he was finally given a spot in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

In his day Rooney was the highest earning actor in Hollywood, was given awards for film and TV, and critical acclaim on stage (pictured left in 1938 in Boy's Town, and right in 1945 with Elizabeth Taylor in National Velvet)

Chris and Jan have always denied all of the allegations against them, and Chris has even accused Mark of keeping Rooney a prisoner during his final years, saying he kept the actor and his wife apart against their wishes, and suggesting that Mark's neglect led to Rooney's death.

In previous interviews with Mail Online, Chris has also alleged that, far from the bubbly, affable characters he portrayed on screen and stage, Rooney himself could also be abusive and controlling

Rooney, once Hollywood's highest paid actor, was the star of his generation - putting together a dazzling career on stage and screen, winning an Emmy, and being nominated for a Tony.

In 1939, then aged just 18, he was awarded a juvenile Oscar, and was tipped for the award twice in the next five years, before being awarded an Honorary statuette in 1983.

He married eight times, first to Ava Gardner in 1942, and produced ten children across the span of his 88-year career, which stretched from the silent films of the Twenties, to the computer animated flicks of 2014.

Rooney testified to being the victim of elder abuse in the Senate in 2011 (pictured), though didn't name the perpetrator. Chris and Jan have always denied all allegations against them

However, a series of ruinous financial decisions, coupled with his many divorces, left him virtually broke and without work.

He met his final wife, Jan Chamberlin, in the Seventies in the midst of this career dry spell.

The pair married in 1978, despite Rooney's situation, but the following year his luck turned around after Sugar Babies, his Broadway debut, opened in New York to rave reviews.

He performed the burlesque-style tribute more than 1,000 times across the globe, including a lengthy stint in London, and according to THR, earned up to $65,000 per week.

Rooney kept working right up until his death, in April 2014, from a heart attack.