British celebrity chef Nigella Lawson, who admitted to using cocaine twice in her life during a hearing for her divorce from Charles Saatchi this summer, was turned away by the US today when she tried to fly to Los Angeles.

Lawson grabbed headlines this summer after images surfaced of her husband, Charles Saatchi, choking her in public. The two had a contentious divorce, and in a related fraud proceeding against two former assistants, Lawson admitted under oath to using cocaine and marijuana on a few isolated occasions.

Lawson, a mother of two, told jurors that she took cocaine with her late husband, John Diamond, when he found out he had terminal cancer and in 2010 when she claimed she was being "subjected to intimate terrorism" by Saatchi.

According to the Immigration and Nationality Act, the US may bar a foreign person who they have determined to be a drug abuser or addict.

A spokesperson for the US Embassy in London wouldn't comment to CNN on why Lawson was turned away, but said Lawson—who films a cooking show in the UK and the US—was invited to come apply for a visa.

[image via AP]