Movie stars behind bars

Does anyone know if you’re allowed to have birthday parties in prison? If there’s one man who hopes that you are, it’s Wesley Snipes. It’s the ‘Demolition Man’ star’s 50th birthday this week and, unfortunately for him, he’ll be spending it in the McKean Pennsylvania Federal Correctional Institution (which is an unnecessarily long-winded way of saying ‘jail’). The 'Blade' actor has been serving his three year sentence since December 2010. His crime? Not shooting Sylvester Stallone in the future or slaying a thousand vampires with a massive sword, but the rather the less exciting ‘willful failure to file federal income tax returns’.

[Related gallery: Movie star mug shots]

Wesley Snipes isn’t the only movie star to have served time, though. In fact, billions of bad boy big screeners have been banged up. Well, not exactly billions. But quite a few. And here are some of the more interesting ones:

Danny Trejo

The reason that Danny Trejo is so convincing as a Mexican criminal in films like ‘Con Air’, ‘Heat’ and ‘Desperado’ is because he spent a significant amount of his life actually being a criminal (and all of it being Mexican). His introduction to the movie business came via another crim-turned-thesp, ‘Reservoir Dogs’ own Mr Blue, the notorious bank robber Eddie Bunker. The pair had served time together at the famously tough Californian jail, San Quentin. Trejo did 11 years of porridge for drugs and robbery charges, spending most of his time inside kicking heroin, becoming a boxing champion and growing a long moustache.

OJ Simpson
‘But OJ Simpson was a sports star and was acquitted of murdering Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman!’ Well, yes - both of those things are true. But he was also a movie star and did end up going to prison. The ‘Naked Gun’ actor decided that a low profile wasn’t for him after sensationally being found innocent of the 1994 murders of his ex-wife and her friend. He wrote a controversial book about the killings called ‘If I Did It’ in 2006 and just two years later was convicted of criminal conspiracy, kidnapping, assault, robbery and using a deadly weapon in a botched Las Vegas robbery. ‘The Juice’ is now serving a 33 year sentence in a Nevada jail.

Mark Wahlberg

The ‘Boogie Nights’ star has done plenty in his 41 years. He’s been a successful rapper, an underwear model, a film star and even a petty criminal. A tough Boston street kid, the young Marky Mark was in and out of trouble for years, culminating with him being charged with attempted murder in 1997 after attacking two men on the street, leaving one partially blinded. He pleaded guilty to assault in the end and served 45 days of a two year term.

Lillo Brancato, Jr.
He might not be the biggest name on this list, but his rap sheet is pretty impressive. Italian-American Brancato played Calogero Anello, the central character in Robert De Niro’s fantastic 1993 directorial bow, the mafia-tinged ‘A Bronx Tale’. He also popped up in ‘The Sopranos’ as a hood called Matthew and as a gangster in ‘Falcone’. Did he perhaps take his roles too seriously? In 2005 Brancato was arrested on suspicion of murdering a policeman. He was later acquitted but was jailed for attempted burglary and is currently in a cell in Colorado. Now that's a method actor!

Robert Downey Jr.

Booze, drugs, guns... Robert Downey Jr. seemingly tried his best to flush his glittering Hollywood career down the toilet. Even two terms in prison couldn’t stop him, though. If anything, he’s just got bigger and better. Well, he is Iron Man, after all...

Tom Sizemore
Never a massive star, Tom Sizemore can still boast a massively impressive CV. The macho actor appeared in some of the ‘90s best movies, including ‘Saving Private Ryan’, True Romance’, ‘Heat’, ‘Point Break’ and ‘Natural Born Killers’. In 2003 he did seven months inside for assault and battery of his infamous ‘Hollywood Madam’ girlfriend, Heidi Fleiss. Then in 2007 he was sentenced to another spell in jail, this time nine months for drugs charges. In between these two terms he found time to appear in ‘Zyzzyx Road’, the lowest grossing movie in history. It made just $30. Now that’s criminal!

Jamie Waylett
The rotund Waylett played the dastardly Draco Malfoy’s sidekick Vincent Crabbe in six of the ‘Harry Potter’ movies. But it turned out that he wasn’t just a trouble maker when he was in character. He managed to swerve a prison sentence in 2009 after being found with quite a bit of marijuana on him. But he wasn’t quite so lucky when he was caught waving a petrol bomb about and drinking stolen champagne during the London riots of last year. He’s now four months into a two year sentence.

Know of any other Hollywood stars that have done bird? Feel free to get discussing some other examples below...