Anthony Pellicano, former celebrity detective, was sentenced Monday to 15 years in prison in his long-standing trials on wiretapping and racketeering charges and will only be eligible for release when in his late seventies.

Anthony Pellicano’s trial was delayed for years but it finally commenced in early March in Los Angeles. Once known as “private eye to the stars,” Pellicano stood trial for racketeering, fraud and conspiracy, as the mastermind behind an elaborate scheme of wiretapping, briberies to law-enforcement officials, telephone company employees and others in order to uncover compromising information for clients preparing themselves for divorce, civil lawsuits and even criminal charges.

Prosecutors said the 64-year-old wiretapped such high-profile individuals as Sylvester Stallone and Keith Carradine and bribed police officers to check police databases for information on comedians such as Garry Shandling and Kevin Nealon. Celebrities, Hollywood executives and attorneys were both clients and victims in Pellicano’s operation.

Earlier this year, he was convicted in two criminal trials of a combined 78 counts, including wiretapping, racketeering, conspiracy and wire fraud.

U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer sentenced Pellicano Monday, December 15, to 15 years in prison and condemned him for his “reprehensible behavior. Probation officials had recommended five years and ten months behind bars, not sufficient for the wiretapping scheme he ran for many years “eagerly, sometimes maliciously, and with pride,” as characterized by Fischer.

Prosecutors had previously asked for a 15-year 8-month sentence.

Pellicano and two other defendants, former Los Angeles police Sgt. Mark Arneson and former telephone company employee Ray Turner, were also ordered to forfeit a total of $2 million. Arneson and Turner are scheduled to be sentenced in January.

In November, Fischer sentenced attorney Terry Christensen, Pellicano’s co-conspirator, to three years in prison. Probation officials had recommended house arrest for him. Fourteen persons have been charged in the wiretapping case and half of these pleaded guilty to charges including perjury and conspiracy, including film director John McTiernan and former Hollywood Records president Robert Pfeifer.

Pellicano represented himself at the federal trials. He only enlisted the help of attorneys before receiving his sentence. Defense attorney Steve Gruel plans to appeal Pellicano’s conviction.

The former sleuth was previously sentenced to jail time in 2003 after pleading guilty to possession of illegal weapons; he was released from prison in 2006 and then indicted on the wiretapping charges.

The drama that unfolded in court and the aftermath are to find their way on our television screens reports Variety, as Pellicano’s wife and three daughters wish to star in a reality show focusing on their attempts to restore his detective agency.