Hollywood action actor Wesley Snipes was sentenced Thursday to three years in jail for three misdemeanour counts of failing to file tax returns.

According to prosecutors the actor escaped paying more than USD 15 M in income tax returns over nearly a decade by sending money to overseas accounts.

"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," Assistant Attorney General Nathan Hochman of the Justice Department's Tax Division commented as cited by CNN.

Before the severe sentence was pronounced, the actor asked the court to show mercy and offered USD 5 million as a gesture of good will.

Federal prosecutors diverted the Snipes' checks to the Treasury, which accepted the payment, but it was still not enough.

Snipes has starred in dozens of movies, including the "Blade" trilogy, "Major League" and "Murder at 1600."

He had his first screen role as an American football player in Goldie Hawn's 1986 comedy Wildcats but his breakthrough role came in 1991 when he was cast as flamboyant drug lord Nino Brown in gangster thriller New Jack City.

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