The son of actor Michael Douglas has been released from prison after more than six years, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Cameron Douglas was in a federal prison in Maryland for drug convictions since 2010. In 2009, he was arrested for selling methamphetamine and cocaine out of the Gansevoort Hotel in New York and as a result was given a five-year sentence.
However, when he was caught for smuggling drugs into Maryland’s Cumberland Federal Corrections Institute—allegedly via his lawyer—two additional years were added onto his sentence.
According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Cameron Douglas is scheduled for full release in March next year and is currently readjusting to civilian life at a residential reentry management program in New York.
His father Michael has publicly spoken about his son’s substance abuse, referring to him as a “serious heroin addict” in a May interview with Fox’s Megyn Kelly.
“I have gone from being a very disappointed but loving father who felt his son got what was due him to realizing that Lady Justice’s blindfold is really slipping,” Douglas told New York Magazine in 2013. “I’m not defending Cameron as a drug dealer or drug addict, but I believe, because of his last name, he’s been made an example.”
The actor also expressed his dismay with the justice system after his 2013 Emmy win for his role as Liberace in “Behind the Candelabra.” He told reporters, according to the LA Times: “Obviously, at first I was disappointed with my son, but I’ve reached a point now where I’m very disappointed with the system.”
“In my son’s case, he has spent almost two years in solitary confinement, and right now I’m being told I cannot see him for two years,” he said.
During his stint in prison, Cameron Douglas wrote an open letter for the Huffington Post. He also questioned the penalties given to drug offenders and called for reform.
“Our prisons are filled with non-violent drug offenders who are losing much of what is relevant in life. This outdated system pays little, if any, concern to the disease of addiction, and instead punishes it more harshly than many violent crimes,” he wrote in 2013.
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