<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"&lt;img width=\"300\" vspace=\"0\" hspace=\"0\" height=\"265\" border=\"0\" align=\"right\" src=\"http://ll-media.tmz.com/2008/04/24/0424_snipes_ap-1.jpg\" alt=\"Wesley Snipes\" /&gt;A judge has just sentenced Wesley Snipes to three years in prison for tax evasion. Forget black -- always bet on the U.S. government!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Snipes was not forced to surrender immediately. Instead, the judge ruled he could surrender at a later date, closer to his New Jersey home. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Nathan J. Hochman, Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department's Tax Division, said, \"Snipes' long prison sentence should send a loud and crystal clear message to all tax defiers that if they engage in similar tax defier conduct, they face joining him and his co-defendants ... as inmates in prison.\"&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Snipes was convicted in February on three misdemeanor charges for not filing his taxes. The government claimed he owed $2.7 mil -- but Snipes' attorneys argued it was just $228,000. No fine was imposed, but the three-year sentence was the max he could have gotten.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;{{tmz_video_0}}&lt;br /&gt;Celebrity friends Denzel Washington and Woody Harrelson &lt;a href=\"http://www.tmz.com/2008/04/23/celebs-sign-up-as-snipers/\"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;wrote letters&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/a&gt; in his defense to appeal for leniency. Oh well ...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;iframe width=\"175\" scrolling=\"no\" height=\"120\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"margin: 0px; float: left;\" border=\"0\" src=\"http://webcenter.polls.aol.com/modular.jsp?template=1098&amp;amp;view=138908&amp;amp;pollId=139050&amp;amp;channel=tmz.com\"&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.tmz.com/2008/04/24/wesley-gets-three-years/5/>