Actor Brad Renfro says rehab is an ‘eye-opener’

LOS ANGELES – Actor Brad Renfro said he’s “tired of paying the consequences” for drinking and drug use and eager to get clean.

The actor, who served 10 days in jail last month after pleading no-contest to driving while intoxicated and pleaded guilty in February to attempted possession of heroin, was in Superior Court Tuesday for a progress report.

Arrested Dec. 22 during a police sting on Skid Row, Renfro, 23, enrolled in a drug-diversion program under a state law that allows people convicted of nonviolent drug possession to receive treatment instead of jail time. He also plans to enter a residential treatment program as part of his rehabilitation, he said.

The actor was arrested for drunken driving on Nov. 24. Besides the 10-day jail sentence, Renfro was ordered to pay a $450 fine and take alcohol-education classes for 18 months.

Rehabilitation is going well, Renfro told reporters outside court.

“It’s going to help me in all phases of my life,” he said. “It’s definitely been an eye-opener.”

Renfro’s next progress report is scheduled for May 2.

Renfro’s film career began when he was 12, acting opposite Susan Sarandon and Tommy Lee Jones in “The Client.” His other credits include “Ghost World” and “The Jacket.”

Musician Peter Gabriel, Sen. Mitch McConnell urge more action on Myanmar

WASHINGTON – Musician Peter Gabriel and Sen. Mitch McConnell joined forces Tuesday in demanding stronger action by the United Nations against atrocities they say are being committed in Myanmar.

McConnell, a leading Republican, said that misrule by the junta that governs Myanmar, also called Burma, “threatens the entire region, and the world community needs to get a lot more concerned than it has been.”

Gabriel praised U.S. sanctions against Myanmar’s military regime and emergency relief efforts to help thousands of Burmese displaced inside their country.

These efforts, he said, “make the U.S. one of the few countries in the world willing to step up to this challenge.”

McConnell said that a rare U.N. Security Council briefing last year on the political and social deterioration in Myanmar is “not nearly enough, but at least it’s a start.”

Gabriel and McConnell want the United Nations to pass a binding resolution demanding change in Myanmar, where the generals have kept pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi in detention for 10 of the last 16 years. She is among some 1,100 political prisoners.