The druggie son of actor Michael Douglas yesterday landed a mere five years behind bars for dealing crystal meth – half the minimum sentence for his federal crime – but a Manhattan judge warned that this was his “last chance to make it.”
Shame-faced Cameron Douglas, 31, who turned federal informant after his arrest in July, admitted:
“I made a lot of mistakes” – as his famous dad, sporting a scowl through most of the proceeding, and his teary-eyed mom, Diandra Douglas, looked on from the second row in the federal courtroom.
But “I believe, your honor, that things will be different this time because I feel I have the full support of my family and parents.
“I would like to apologize to my family … and for my behaviors … I’d like to ask you for the opportunity to be a productive family member and a good role model.”
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The sometime actor and ex-DJ could have been slapped with a much harsher sentence.
But after a flurry of emotional letters from celebs, including his “Wall Street” actor father, legendary granddad Kirk Douglas and ex-Knick coach Pat Riley – and the revelation that he worked with prosecutors – Judge Richard Berman handed him five years.
Berman noted that Cameron will get credit for the eight months he’s already served in jail. And if he gets into a drug-treatment program behind bars, the privileged perp could have another year shaved off his sentence.
The judge, referencing letters from Michael Douglas and other family pleading for leniency, said the missives indicate “problematic parenting by both his mother and father in the forms of parental absence and distance, parental immaturity and drug and alcohol abuse in the immediate or extended families.”
The judge added, “I respectfully say also that they [the family] did not … explain what has changed in their lives that would enable them to do things differently now, better with Cameron today, than they did before.”
But Berman noted that the troubled Hollywood rich kid is far from the victim he’s being portrayed as.
“We all need to get over the theme that Cameron Douglas is a victim,” he said. “Some of the letters reflect a somewhat naive and even misguided viewpoint.
“I think this case and this sentencing may well be his last chance to make it.”
Cameron, reading from a prepared statement, insisted:
“Nothing, your honor, is more important to me than my family and the goals that I have set for myself, and I feel adamant that I will not let myself be led astray by my warped thinking. and false pretenses due to my long heroin addiction.
“I was presented with some opportunities earlier in my life, and at the time … I wasn’t able to see how valuable they were. … As a result, I squandered a lot of them.
Prosecutors – in a private sidebar discussion with the judge before sentencing – had asked for “a downward departure” from the much stiffer guidelines “based on substantial assistance by Mr. Douglas,” according to the court transcripts.
Berman didn’t mention Cameron’s cooperation, saying only that the softer sentence allows him to get needed “medical and correctional treatment.”
The judge noted that this is the longest Cameron has been sober – a full eight months from his incarceration in August – since he was 13.
Cameron’s chisel-chinned dad – who has at least partly blamed his son’s illicit antics on the pressures of being the son of Hollywood royalty – sat grim-faced next to ex-wife Diandra.
Diandra blew her son a kiss as he entered the courtroom, and later, as he was being sentenced, dabbed her eyes with a tissue and sniffled.
Cameron was busted in a hotel room at the Gansevoort in the Meatpacking District on July 28, strung out and facing charges that he was the middleman in a deal to move a half-pound of crystal meth from California to sell in New York.
Then, less than two weeks later, while under house arrest at his mother’s tony Manhattan pad, the bad-boy acting wannabe was arrested again – for begging his girlfriend to bring him drugs, which she tried to smuggle past guards in an electric toothbrush.
As part of his sentence, Cameron will have to forfeit $300,000, more than half of what his lawyers said was his estimated $500,000 net worth.
Additionally, he must pay a $25,000 fine and serve 450 hours of community service.
Cameron’s defense team described him as a lonely kid who lived in fear “of being compared to his father and his grandfather.”
Far from a “drug kingpin,” the younger Douglas, “at the time of his arrest, was an unemployed drug addict dealing with a five-time-a-day heroin habit.
“At the time of his arraignment … he was shivering, and he was barely able to stand up straight,” his lawyer said.
After court, a somber Michael Douglas was overheard telling his lawyer, “It’s fair.”
He then guided a bewildered-looking Diandra through a crush of photographers to a waiting car.