The actor pleaded guilty today in an Australian court of bringing vials of restricted muscle-building hormones into the country and now faces sentencing next week. Lawyers for the 60-year-old star of the “Rocky” and “Rambo” movies entered the guilty pleas on his behalf; Stallone, who also had vials of testerone, didn’t appear.

Stallone was accused of bringing banned substances into Australia after a customs search of his luggage during a Feb. 16 visit to Sydney revealed 48 vials of the human growth hormone product, Jintropin.

Three days later, Stallone threw four vials of testosterone from his Sydney hotel room when customs officials arrived to search it, a prosecutor told the court. Human growth hormone is considered a performance enhancing drug in Australia and it cannot be imported without a permit from the national drug regulator.

The maximum penalty for bringing Jintropin into Australia illegally is a fine of $91,500 and five years in prison, but Stallone faces a maximum penalty of just $18,000 on each of the two charges because the matter is being heard by a local, not federal, court.

“The defendant, Sylvester Stallone, is extremely mortified about having been involved in this incident,” says his lawyer. “Had he known that what he was doing was contrary to Australian law, he almost certainly would not have done it…This was a legitimate medical condition being treated by doctors of the top ranking order in the west coast of the United States.”

Really? Then why does Stallone tell this to reporters in Los Angeles:

“Just because people get older doesn’t mean they abandon their dream or their ability to want to do something, so Rocky is symbolic of still wanting to participate. I want to show that life is not over at 50. People say, ‘Come on, grow old gracefully.’ No, why? I’m not ready.”

Meanwhile, the prosecutor charges Stallone demonstrated a “consciousness of guilt” by throwing the testosterone from the hotel. Prosecution documents handed to the court in March said Stallone had marked “No” on a customs declaration card that asked if he was bringing into Australia restricted or prohibited goods “such as medicines, steroids, firearms, weapons, or any kind of illicit drugs.”

“I made a terrible mistake, not because I was attempting to deceive anyone but I was simply ignorant to your official rules,” Stallone said in a letter to the court, claiming the drugs had been perscribed to him for an unspecified medical condition. “I feel terrible that my breach of the rules has set a poor example to members of the public, whose opinion I cherish dearly.”

Of course, he does. He cares that the public believes he is fit to do another horrible remake as a washed-up boxer. If only there were a medicine to improve the muscle in the brain.

Source: various Associated Press dispatches (quotes were taken from more than one AP story).

[tags]Sylvester Stallone[/tags]