Kimbella Responds To Erica Mena's "Love & Hip Hop" Set-Up Accusations

"Love & Hip Hop" cast member Kimbella has come forward to address accusations by show newcomer Erica Mena after blaming VH1 for setting up their televised fist fight this past week.

According to Kimbella, VH1 did not wrongfully edit out or intentionally do ill will toward Mena.

Kimbella's coming to the defense of VH1 -- claiming producers didn't misrepresent Erica on the show ... the fight happened exactly the way everyone saw it on television. Kimbella tells us, "VH1 didn't do editing on anything with [Erica]. That's who she is" -- insisting she's using the fight for publicity ... to boost her struggling career. (TMZ)

Despite Kim's stance, "Love & Hip Hop" co-star/manager Yandy Smith has sided with Mena.

The on-again, off-again manager of rapper Jim Jones, doesn't seem to enjoy being labeled the instigator of all the chaos lighting up the season. She opens up to YBF about how certain scenes were set up by the producers who were no doubt hoping to make the sparks fly by using her as a catalyst. The Kimbella and Eric Mena fiasco was a typical example of the "staged maneuver" that so many reality shows implement to get viewers coming back for more. (VIBE Vixen)

Following the show's airing, Mena blamed VH1 for hurting her image.

"Love & Hip Hop" star Erica Mena tells TMZ, the vicious, glass-smashing, hair-pulling cat fight between her and Kimbella Vanderhee has torpedoed her modeling career -- and it's all VH1's fault. But the 24-year-old tells us, she was completely misrepresented in the episode -- blaming show editors for unfairly portraying her as the bad guy ... and Kimbella as an angel. Erica tells us, "My whole image in my career is now affected by this. I wanted them to pull this clip because I don't want to show this side of me." Clearly, VH1 refused. (TMZ)

Earlier this week, she offered her take on Monday's televised bout.

"I'm really passionate about eveything that I've done in my career and I'm not saying that I'm perfect because I'm far from that but you know, I definitely take pride in what I do -- what I will say is that the scene was definitely condensed to one sound byte. A lot of the dialogue between me and Kimbella was left on the cutting room floor. ... What was left out was the fact that my career was being compared to hers and that was kind of a big no-no. However, I don't condone the violence, I'm not a violent person and if I could go back, I would definitely take different actions because it was uncalled for. We're mothers, we're grown women, regardless of whether I respect her line of what she does or what she is as a person or whatever, it's something that I'm not proud of. Like I said, I'm not a violent person. If I could take it back, I absolutely would." (Power 105.1)