6/07/2007

How to get your jail sentence reduced by almost 90 percent: Cry

This is almost too funny. Paris Hilton was supposed to serve something like 23 days in jail (the sentence was 45 days, but with good behavior she was expected to get out in 23 days). Hilton still must serve home detention and it will be for the full 45 days.

On the heels of reports that Hilton had been crying in jail and receiving visits from her psychiatrist, reporters at the press conference seemed to think that the heiress had manipulated her jailers.

Whitmore didn't fully deny this accusation. When one reporter asked him, “What’s your comment to people who say she played you like a puppet on a string — she came in here, didn’t like it, it was hard and she got out?” he replied, “Once again, I just think that’s a different way of saying it, only the language is a little more — liquid. I would simply say that I understand that."

The sheriff's spokesman would not elaborate on Hilton's medical issues, nor would he say if they were physical or psychological. He added that the decision to send Hilton home was based on dozens of consultations and discussions over a period of three or four days.


I could write a defense of this for Ms. Hilton given that a day in jail for her must represent much more of a penalty in terms of forgone income than a day for most others, but I will not press the point in this case.

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6 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Obviously I don't know any of the specifics regarding how/why Paris has been relocated & confined to home with an electronic ankle tag...but I have to say, that despite the predictable criticism of "she played the system for fools", "crocodile tears", "special treatment for the rich" etc...I think that there is good cause to relocate her *anyway*.

As far as I know, she was in solitary confinement for her own protection. She was convicted of a minor offence, with a minor encarceration penalty...she is not a murderer or otherwise a danger to the inmates...yet she is confined to a cell for 23 hours a day.

Solitary confinment is hard time...and as a punishment, does not fit her crime.

She's a fragile naive airhead. I imagine being locked down like that was quite horrific for her.

Had she been left to serve her term, I would have been supportive of her suing the system on grounds of 'cruel & unusual punishment'...and with her resources, I suspect she'd win.

Quite frankly, 'celebrity' *does* matter. She would be at far greater risk, being exposed to inmates, than any regular joe...she could be brutalized, held hostage, used in any manner of ways as leverage. To knowingly send her into that situation would have been criminal reckless endangerment on behalf of the system...so they didn't do it.

Ultimately, home confinement was the only humane choice...no matter what the truth behind allegations of "crocodile tears" etc.

I think that the press at the conference were guilty of displaying a rather ugly side to our society at large...that our ghoulish desire to see 'the rich' 'get what's coming to them' overrides our humanity and dispassionate sense of justice. Shameful.

I just hope that Paris has indeed learned something from all this...I don't think there will be much sypathy left for her if she continues to demonstrate contempt for the law.

-dk

6/07/2007 4:41 PM  
Blogger John Lott said...

Dear Anonymous:

Excellent comment. The solitary confinement issue is a useful point to raise.

Thanks.

6/07/2007 6:27 PM  
Anonymous straightarrow said...

No it isn't a valid point. What the Hell ever happened to Noblesse Oblige?

From her exalted position in society, though undeserved, she had a responsibility to NOT be a common criminal, not even on a misdemeanor scale.

6/08/2007 5:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You forgot the most important element in cases like this, wait 24 hours.

Mike

6/08/2007 8:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Since the fit and the shan are now indistinguishable in this fiasco, I guess we'll just have to sit back and observe the bewildering mess with resignation.

I wonder how many illegal aliens are being swept under the carpet as the justice system and the media lavish their rabid attention on Paris?

-dk

6/08/2007 9:10 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"What the Hell ever happened to Noblesse Oblige?"

It is apparently still rattling around in your vivid imagination...thankfully it has yet to emerge in liberal revisionist constitutionalism.

When it does emerge, you can enjoy sticking it to the rich and 'exhalted' good.

6/10/2007 12:24 PM  

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