MONTREAL - It will be 40 months in a real-life slammer for a Quebec actor who played a make-believe mobster on TV.
Actor Tony Conte has been sentenced today after being found guilty by a jury of conspiracy and possession of cocaine with intent to traffic.
The minor Quebec celebrity was a major player, according to authorities, in a cocaine transaction cooked up with undercover police at a Montreal hotel.
Conte was arrested in October 2008 while trying to buy 30 kilograms of cocaine.
Justice Sophie Bourque handed down her sentence this morning, sentencing him to 42 months minus time served.
That leaves Conte with a sentence of 39 months and 20 days.
Conte's legal team had argued that he should get a sentence of less than two years to be served in the community.
The Crown, on the other hand, wanted a prison sentence of between five and six years.
The four others Conte was charged with all pleaded guilty quickly to similar charges and received sentences that ranged from two to six years.
Conte had testified that he had unwittingly found himself in the middle of a drug transaction and had no idea what was going on.
Conte had also tried to claim ignorance of text messages left on his phone, claiming he didn't understand English.
The Montreal actor is best known for playing a fictional mobster in the French-language crime drama "Omerta'' in the 1990s.
