WASHINGTON — Senior police launched an investigation Wednesday after a force escort raced Charlie Sheen to his Washington, D.C. performance the night before.
Two marked cars with flashing sirens surrounded the actor’s caravan of two vehicles from the airport to his show at the DAR Constitution Hall late Tuesday, raising eyebrows about police resources being provided for a celebrity.
“This escort was handled as a reimbursable detail. This means that the government was reimbursed for the services provided,” a Metropolitan Police Department told NewsCore, adding “However, this entire matter is under investigation.”
Sheen, 45, bragged about his special treatment when he arrived in the nation’s capital in the nick of time for his evening performance.
“In car with Police escort in front and rear! driving like someone’s about to deliver a baby! Cop car lights #Spinning!” Sheen tweeted, posting a photo of his car’s speedometer needle pointed at 80mph (129kph).
Sheen took a cross-country flight to the east coast after wrapping up a custody hearing with estranged wife Brooke Mueller in Los Angeles, where he unsuccessfully bid for sole custody of the couple’s twin boys.
He continues to travel the US on his “Violent Torpedo of Truth: Defeat is Not an Option” tour which has received mixed reviews since kicking off in Detroit on April 2, when he was booed off stage.
Sheen is now bringing in an Australian radio presenter to help save the stage show, The (Sydney) Daily Telegraph reported.
The “Two And A Half Men” actor called Scott Dooley — co-host of a breakfast show on Sydney radio station Nova — on Tuesday and invited him to be the on-stage moderator-interviewer for the revamped live show for at least the next week.
The unlikely friendship blossomed last month, at the peak of Sheen’s globally publicized meltdown, when they made a short film together.
“He’s called and asked me to be the moderator-interviewer for his Atlanta, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale shows and I’m going — I don’t know how long I’ll be with him because I have to get back to work,” Dooley said.
“I have no idea what I’m meant to be doing but I’ll have to learn quickly as my flight arrives just before the show.”
An out-of-the-blue call this week sparked the mercy mission. Sheen told Dooley, “The idea was for me to be truth-seeking and story-telling but after the first reviews I realized I’d done neither.
“But this tour has been a friggin’ odyssey; more intense than anything I have done that hasn’t involved crack.”
What started as a pilloried one-man show has turned into a more critically appreciated production in which Sheen is interviewed by various broadcasters instead of just ad-lib-blabbing and boring audiences.