State Sen. Dave Aronberg's campaign for Florida's top law-enforcement job is getting fundraising help from an ex-convict whose latest arrest came as recently as last year.

Jeffrey R. Gibson, a Jupiter boxing instructor and partner in a hormone-therapy product website, recently recruited contributors to a Palm Beach Gardens dinner to pump up the senator's run for attorney general. ''We need somebody we know and trust in this office,'' Gibson wrote to invitees.

But court records from Arkansas, California and South Florida show the champion kickboxer-turned-businessman has an arrest record that doesn't match the squeaky-clean image that a law-enforcement candidate might want from someone publicly assisting his campaign.

Aronberg, a Harvard Law School graduate and a Democratic state senator from Greenacres since 2002, said he didn't know about Gibson's record and that Gibson's involvement in his campaign has been minimal. He said Gibson is not on the campaign staff and has never contributed to any of his campaigns, nor did he even contribute to the dinner.

Aronberg said he does not see any need for action on his part now.

He recalled that he had met Gibson at a Hurricane Katrina charity event a few years ago, then saw him at a Palm Beach Gardens networking event earlier this year, and then a month ago at the Palm Beach Gardens wedding of mutual friends. At the wedding, Aronberg and a small group that included Gibson chatted about the upcoming campaign dinner.

''Jeff offered to contact people,'' Aronberg said. ``There was no host committee. The contacts were his friends, and that's the extent of it.''

The $125-a-plate fundraiser took place June 25 at the Ocean Grill & Sushi Bar on PGA Boulevard. The dinner raised about $1,500, the candidate said Tuesday. In an interview Monday, Gibson had estimated that he alone had raised more than twice that -- $3,000 to $4,000.

It was not clear why the numbers diverge, but Aronberg said his campaign would post its official tally of contributions on Friday.

Gibson, 49, is an instructor at the Jupiter Boxing Club and a partner in a business called LifeStyleRejuvenation.com, which touts hormone replacement therapy and products such as ''Digestive Cleanse'' and ``Erexa Sexual Enhancer for Men.''

Court records show that Gibson, a six-foot-two, sixth-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do, served almost two years of a four-year sentence in a California prison in the 1990s after pleading guilty to stalking and injuring a spouse. In that case, prosecutors alleged that he broke his five-foot-six wife's hand and threw her to the ground, then hunted her down after she escaped.

Gibson ''appears to be a loose cannon,'' a deputy district attorney in San Diego County wrote in a sentencing memo in May 1994. She alleged that Gibson's records ``indicate a history of violence towards women as well as obsessive stalking behavior.''

''The only way to protect society is to lock the defendant up for the maximum time possible,'' the prosecutor wrote.

Shortly after his release, Gibson was sentenced to 12 months in a federal prison in Colorado for violating the terms of his supervised release arising from a federal felony mail-fraud case, records show. The new prison term occurred after a probation officer alleged that Gibson had assaulted two women, among other violations.

He was arrested on Florida domestic battery-related charges in 2004 and 2008, Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office records show. In the 2004 case, he pleaded no contest to domestic battery and was on probation for 12 months. The judge withheld a finding of guilt.

In the 2008 case, he was arrested on a charge of violating an injunction for protection against domestic violence. Charges were dismissed in that case after he completed a domestic battery-prevention program that included classes in anger management, records show.

Gibson said Monday that ''I have nothing to hide.'' He said he admires Aronberg and wants to help him by raising money and introducing him to people he knows, such as boxing promoter Don King.

A spokesman for King said he doesn't recall meeting Gibson, but that Gibson has participated in boxing promotions with King staffers.

''Probably 95 percent of our politicians are pretty shady,'' Gibson said. ``One thing I can say about Dave: This guy's as straight as an arrow.''

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