American Gangster’ Frank Lucas faces jail for allegedly bilking feds of 17G

Frank Lucas, the one-time Harlem heroin kingpin who inspired the movie ‘American Gangster,’ appears in court in Newark.

Richard Corkery/New York Daily News

Denzel Washington playing Frank Lucas in the movie ‘American Gangster.

The ending of “American Gangster,” the movie about a Harlem heroin kingpin starring Denzel Washington, might need a rewrite.

Frank Lucas, who once ran a billion-dollar business smuggling heroin before going straight, could go to jail for bilking the U.S. government out of $17,300.

Now 81 and ailing, Lucas was charged with theft by deception after he allegedly told the U.S. Treasury he lost a Social Security check with funds earmarked for his 15-year-old son and asked for a duplicate, prosecutors said.

Then he cashed both checks in Newark, they said.

Lucas has denied doing anything wrong and is reportedly been trying to work out a deal to keep out of the can, The Star-Ledger of Newark reported.

“American Gangster” broke box office records when it was released in 2007 and made Lucas a celebrity.

But it drew the ire of the Daily News’ Stanley Crouch, who denounced it as “poisonous eye candy” for glorifying a criminal.

While Washington played a “soft-spoken and sophisticated man,” the real Lucas was “illiterate and could not count,” Crouch wrote.

“He not only killed people to impress his ruthlessness on the underworld, but even put out a murder contract on one of his own brothers,” Crouch wrote.

Lucas was busted in 1975, convicted of drug dealing and sentenced to 70 years. But he began spilling the beans on other dealers, enabling the feds to make more than 100 other arrests.

He and his family were placed in the witness protection program.

Then in 1984, Lucas was caught trying to exchange an ounce of heroin and $13,000 for a kilo of cocaine. He served seven years in prison and was released in 1991.

From that point on, Lucas stayed out of trouble and faded into obscurity until the movie about his life was released.

Three former Drug Enforcement Administration agents later sued the movie distributor for $55 million, contending they were slandered.

A Manhattan judge tossed the suit, saying it was without merit.