Actor Wesley Snipes has been granted bail while he appeals against his conviction for tax offences, BBC News reports. The 45-year-old Blade star was sentenced in April to three years in prison, the maximum penalty, for failing to file income tax returns between 1999 and 2001.

A U.S. judge granted Snipes’ request for bail saying the star did not pose a flight risk nor was a threat to the community. However, the actor is due to report to prison authorities by 3 June to begin his sentence.

Actors Woody Harrelson and Denzel Washington attested Snipes’ good character and his lawyers recommended he be given home detention and ordered to make public service announcements, as the actor did not have previous criminal record and his three convictions were all misdemeanors. However, U.S. District Judge William Terrell Hodges said Snipes exhibited a “history of contempt over a period of time” for U.S. tax laws and mentioned “In my mind these are serious crimes, albeit misdemeanors.”

“I am an idealistic, naive, passionate, truth-seeking, spiritually motivated artist, unschooled in the science of law and finance,” Snipes read from a written statement, cited by the Associated Press. He said his wealth and celebrity attracted “wolves and jackals like flies are attracted to meat” and he called himself “well-intentioned, but miseducated.”

Snipes’ attorneys plan to argue before the eleventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the trial judge made errors in several ways before and after the actor’s February conviction. The day of Snipes’ sentencing, his lawyers brought checks totaling $5 million, which they gave to Internal Revenue Service agents during a recess.