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Keanu Reeves is asking a federal judge to show leniency in sentencing Carl Rinsch, the director convicted of defrauding Netflix<\/a> of $11 million.<\/p>\n The actor’s letter was included in a Tuesday night sentencing submission for Rinsch, who directed Reeves in the 2013 movie “47 Ronin.”<\/p>\n Reeves wrote that Rinsch tends to “self-sabotage” by pushing the boundaries of negotiated agreements. “I am, of course, not a therapist or psychologist,” Reeves wrote in a letter to US District Judge Jed Rakoff. “I write instead as an artistic peer of Carl’s, and as a friend.”<\/p>\n A Manhattan federal jury convicted Rinsch of defrauding Netflix after he took millions of dollars to make an ambitious sci-fi epic called “White Horse”<\/a> \u2014 and never finished the project. Prosecutors said Rinsch used the money for a lavish spending spree<\/a> that included more than 480 food deliveries from Postmates and Uber Eats, a $439,000 handmade Swedish mattress<\/a>, and other luxury goods.<\/p>\n Reeves continued to champion Rinsch after “47 Ronin” flopped at the box office. A Netflix executive testified at Rinsch’s trial that she greenlit “White Horse” after reading the script at Reeves’ home. Preliminary episodes and concept art<\/a> were included in the evidence in Rinsch’s criminal trial.<\/p>\n “In my opinion, Carl is an exceptional artist and ‘White Horse,’ in the form in which I saw it, was a superb and visionary work of art, although unfinished,” Reeves wrote in his letter. Rinsch has brought “creative inspiration” and “exceptional joy and warmth” to people around him, Reeves wrote.<\/p>\n Two paragraphs of Reeves’ letter are redacted without explanation. Records related to Rinsch’s health have been redacted elsewhere on the court docket. <\/p>\n Other friends who wrote letters for the sentencing submission referred to Rinsch having had “a period of severe psychological instability” and “a break from reality” when he was making “White Horse.” His brother wrote in a letter, which is also partially redacted, that Rinsch was “no longer reasoning clearly” during that time period.<\/p>\n