Paris goes to jail

One of the top stories that was on the news this morning was that the heiress, Paris Hilton, was sentenced to spend 45 days in jail for violating her parole.

Her excuse is that she is treated unfairly because of who she is and that the cops are out to get her because they have all hit on her and she's turned them down. Now, I will say that I don't necessarily wish jail time on someone - but I do think that Paris should absolutely pay down her time in the slammer.

Paris Hilton was actually late yesterday to her own court appearance which doesn't make a judge happy. Believe me. I had a professor in law school once who told me that, "Early is on time, on time is late, and late is unacceptable..." and then he went on to tell stories of how cases have been thrown out simply because a party was late. It just goes to show that Paris has absolutely no respect for the legal system and expected to walk through it with nothing more than a slap on the wrist. Perhaps she expected His Honor to hit on her as well.

The other thing that drives me nuts about this all is that she tried to blame it on Elliot Mintz, her publicist (who in my opinion, deserves to be nominated for some kind of sainthood) by saying that Elliot told her she could drive under certain circumstances. Well, ignorance is fortunately not a defense to the law. But, the total ludicrousness of this whole incident keeps getting expounded. A petition has been drafted trying to get the California governor to pardon Paris because she provides "beauty and excitement to (most of) our otherwise mundane lives." Ahem. Offensive. As if Arnie didn't have anything better to do, he should grant Paris a pardon because she's pretty. Get over it. She urges all fans to "sihn" her petition. My guess is that she may not have been so ignorant if she had actually taken the time to learn how to read and spell. Then, she could have read the charges against her, actually understood that she wasn't supposed to driver her car, and learned how to spell "sign" in the process.

I was watching some special last night about creative sentencing, which I wholeheartedly support. It involved using embarrassment - rather than jail time - for non-violent offenders to really get the message across that their actions were wrong. It involved everything from lecturing in a dog costume to children about pet care for a man who abused dogs to wearing a sign indicating her crime in front of the store from where this woman stole. Naomi Campbell was sentenced under creativity for making the princess/supermodel perform community service in the sanitation department. My point is, that in the spirit of "creative sentencing," jail time is probably a perfect punishment for Paris. Gone are her pills, booze, labels, pets, and her luxury. For the first time in her life, she'll just be another person. But, I doubt she'll actually take prison that seriously.

Now, Paris is claiming that she was treated unfairly because of "who she is." And, while I don't disagree entirely, my guess is that she's seeing it through rose colored glasses. In a poll on People.com, 91% of people believe that Paris should go to jail. My guess is it's not because of what she did wrong, necessarily, it's because most people can't stand her - because of "who she is." It isn't because the wold loves her, it's because she made herself famous for partying, crotch shots, and amateur porn movies.

Or, maybe the judge's kid got harassed on "The Simple Life." His Honor has his reasons too, you know. But, I'm happy to see at least one person take a stand and actually enforce the law.