The charges stem from a report of a fight by the 53-year-old rapper's fiancé. Flavor Flav, whose given name is William Drayton Jr, was also said to have threatened the woman's teenage son with a knife, police said in a statement.

Flavor Flav was arrested after a call to police came in before dawn on Wednesday from a residence about 10 miles southwest of the Las Vegas Strip, police said. He is due to appear in court on Monday.

"The caller advised she had been involved in a physical altercation with her fiancé who was identified as William Drayton," the police statement said.

Flavor Flav has posted on his Twitter account a tweet by a follower that said, "Someone forgot to tell (Flavor Flav) not everything that happens in Vegas stays in Vegas."

The rap star faces a maximum six years in prison if convicted of assault with a deadly weapon and up to six months in jail if found guilty of domestic violence battery, said Tess Driver, a spokeswoman for the Clark County District Attorney's Office.

The Long Island-born Flavor Flav is best known as a rapper with the politically oriented group Public Enemy, which rose to fame in the 1980s with albums such as "Yo! Bum Rush the Show" and "It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back".

His attention-grabbing wardrobe features a giant clock that he wears around his neck, and a Viking helmet. He opened a Las Vegas fried chicken and shrimp restaurant in March called "Flavor Flav's House of Flavor", which closed less than six months later.

In recent years, he has also starred in a number of reality shows, including "Flavor of Love", which ran from 2006 to 2008 and saw him look for a suitable romantic match from a bevy of female contestants.

(Reporting by Tim Pratt; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Dale Hudson)

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