Entertainment

Lucy Lawless pleads guilty to trespassing on oil-drilling ship

June 14, 2012 / 10:15 AM EDT / CBS/AP

Actress Lucy Lawless joins activists in stopping a Shell-contracted drillship from departing the port of Taranaki, New Zealand, Feb. 24, 2012. AP Photo/Greenpeace

(CBS/AP) Actress Lucy Lawless pleaded guilty Thursday to trespassing on an oil-drilling ship in New Zealand in February with other Greenpeace activists to try and keep it from leaving port.

The 44-year-old New Zealand native is due to be sentenced in September and faces a maximum three years in jail. Prosecutors reduced the more serious charge of burglary.

In February, the "Spartacus" actress and five other Greenpeace environmental activists spent four days perched atop a 174-foot drilling tower on the Noble Discoverer in Port Taranaki in a protest against Arctic oil exploration. Eight activists pleaded guilty Thursday at the Auckland District Court.

"Yeah, I think we've helped kick off a great movement,'' she said, reports the New Zealand Herald. "We want to tell [deep-sea oil drillers] absolutely under no circumstances is this a good idea. They are robbing our children of their birthright to a clean and healthy planet, and they know it."