We all need a little relaxation from time to time.
And that’s especially true if you’re in legal trouble or going through a rough patch in your career.
Take, for example, a man who has been in and out of court for years and even spent time behind bars recently.
It’s enough to make anyone tense.
So it wasn’t surprising to see Andrew O’Keefe sneaking into a backstreet massage parlor in Bondi earlier this month for a quick massage.
O’Keefe, dressed in a short-sleeved shirt and shorts, was seen discussing the various services available at Miss Massage on Gould Street shortly after 7pm on Thursday, November 7.
Deal or no deal? Andrew O’Keefe investigates the services offered by Miss Massage in Bondi
And he might as well have gotten a good deal.
When we checked in at Miss Massage, located a 10-minute drive from the former TV star’s modest apartment in nearby Vaucluse, a receptionist said the salon offered a half-hour deep tissue message for $50, while a full hour It was only $30 more.
It’s a bargain for a man who once earned around $800,000 a year at Seven.
However, he warned that anyone expecting a happy ending would be sorely disappointed, saying: “No, we don’t do that here”, and Daily Mail Australia does not suggest otherwise.
Still, O’Keefe seemed relaxed and carefree – and smiling again for the first time in months – the next day as he ran errands in a black Mercedes sedan around the city’s eastern suburbs.
The 53-year-old’s life spiraled out of control this year, with repeated court appearances for a string of offenses amid a well-documented struggle with drug addiction.
In October, O’Keefe was ordered into rehab after pleading guilty to burglary, breach of an AVO and possession of a prohibited drug.
He had been out on bail for the first two offenses when he was arrested again on September 16 after police said he found methamphetamine in his car during a search.
The visit comes as the fallen Seven star undergoes court-ordered drug rehab.
The former lawyer then spent weeks in detention at the Metropolitan Detention and Reception Center in Sydney’s notorious Silverwater prison complex while awaiting his next court appearance.
During his time behind bars, he was constantly mocked by his fellow inmates, who took every opportunity to mock the former Deal or No Deal host for his tragic fall.
Prison sources said one group of accused criminals were particularly ruthless and crossed their arms in front of their faces whenever they saw him in the prison yard, shouting ‘No deal!’ him.
Despite the harassment, O’Keefe did not make any formal complaints about his treatment within the facility, preferring to keep a low profile and to himself as much as possible.
Prison officials did not consider the taunting serious enough to segregate the former Channel Seven star from the general population or offer him protective custody. He shared a two-bed cell with another inmate at the center,
O’Keefe was earning $800,000 a year as the presenter of Seven’s The Chase Australia and Weekend Sunrise before his tragic fall from grace.
O’Keefe was seen running errands in Sydney’s eastern suburbs the day after the massage trip.
During his sentencing in October, Magistrate Jacqueline Milledge warned O’Keefe that he faced an almost certain prison sentence if he broke the law again.
“You have been given many opportunities to do something about your drug use,” he told O’Keefe.
‘I can assure you that the next step is jail. I’m not just saying that, I mean it.
‘It has reached a state where the court would believe that it simply cannot be rehabilitated.
‘Personally, I am disappointed that you are where you are and have not managed to recover.
“I just wish you would get back to a position where you can do something for the community again.”
O’Keefe told the court that while he now had a “strained” relationship with his children, they were still “the dearest things in my life” and he wanted to overcome his debilitating drug addiction for them.
The one-time golden boy of television spent weeks behind bars in custody in Silverwater
O’Keefe arrives at Rose Bay police station before being arrested in September
“They are wonderful and I want to be there for them and now I understand that there is no drug in the world that will allow that to happen if it is in my life,” he said.
Milledge sentenced O’Keefe to a 30-month community corrections order, contingent on him engaging in drug rehabilitation.
He was also ordered to pay a $2,000 fine and suspended from driving for three months for the drug charge, and was fined an additional $500 for the trespassing offense.
It came just weeks after the same magistrate told O’Keefe he was “lucky to be alive” after emergency services had to rush him to hospital after suffering a heroin overdose in his apartment in the eastern suburbs.