Sizemore Back in the Slammer

Tue., Jun. 5, 2007 4:27 PM PDT by Josh Grossberg

Another downer for the Black Hawk Down star.

Tom Sizemore surrendered Tuesday in a Los Angeles courtroom for an alleged probation violation resulting from a May methamphetamine arrest, prosecutors confirmed.

"He did turn himself in and was immediately taken into custody and handcuffed by the bailiff," said Jane Robison, a spokesperson for the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.

Escorted by a bodyguard, Sizemore walked into the Airport Branch of the Los Angeles Superior Court and said little to the phalanx of reporters awaiting his arrival, pausing only to tell local TV station ABC7 that "it was a relapse."

In May Sizemore, 45, was collared in the parking lot of the Four Points Sheraton in Bakersfield, California, and booked on seven drug-related charges.

The Hollywood tough guy, in town working on an indie film, was nabbed after he and another man, 33-year-old Jason Salcido, mixed it up with a front desk clerk over a botched reservation. Police found the two men holed up in a Ford Mustang with two bags of crystal meth and related paraphernalia, as well as Vicodin, Klonopin and Valium, none of which Sizemore had a prescription for, authorities said.

Sizemore pleaded not guilty May 22 to five felony counts of transportation of methamphetamine, possession of methamphetamine and three counts of possessing a controlled substance without the proper prescriptions, offenses that could net him up to six years in prison.

After learning of the Bakersfield bust, prosecutors in Los Angeles filed a motion asking that he be held without bail for failing to obey the specific terms of his probation in a 2004 drug case. The actor was expressly forbidden from possessing narcotics and associating with known drug users and sellers.

The following year, he was found in violation after skipping several court-ordered drug tests and also trying to fake a test with a prosthetic device known as a Whizzinator. While Sizemore could have been locked up for 16 months, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Paula Adele Mabrey decided to give him another chance after the Saving Private Ryan actor offered a tearful mea culpa and promised to clean up his act in rehab. Instead, Mabrey restored his probation, but extended it for an additional three years.

According to Robison, Sizemore's attorney requested a new judge in the case. The actor was assigned to Judge Cynthia Ravis, who remanded him to custody without bail pending the outcome of a June 19 hearing on whether his probation should be revoked. If it is, he's still looking at a possible 16 months in the slammer.

Meanwhile, his next hearing in the Bakersfield case is scheduled for June 18.