GOODY TWO SHOES: … But Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others
As details about Paris Hilton’s 23-day prison stint trickle out, it is increasingly apparent that the celebutante was given 5-Star treatment during her incarceration, despite Sheriff Lee Baca promise to the Los Angeles Times that, "she won't get better food, she won't get a different lockup time or a different environment."
The Sheriff's Department has launched an internal investigation into whether the 26-year old hotel heiress got perks and privileges not bestowed on other inmates:
† Paris was given crisp new prison duds to wear, instead of a used uniform like everyone else.
† She spent one week of her sentence in a medical ward at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility where taxpayers shelled out $1,109.78 a day for her upkeep, instead of the $99.64 a day it would have cost had she been housed in the general population.
† When she was transferred back to the "special needs" unit of the Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood on June 13th, Paris served the rest of her time in solitary confinement, away from the other 2,200 prisoners. Despite overcrowding so severe that offenders are routinely released after serving just hours of their sentences, the second bunk in her cell was left empty.
† Sheriff’s Deputies allege that Paris had access to a cell phone any time she wanted, instead having to wait her turn to use a pay phone during the period of the day allotted for making phone calls. And a captain personally hand-delivered her mail.
The favoritism extended to her family as well.
The Associated Press reported that upon her transfer back to Lynwood, "Paris Hilton's parents visited their daughter after breezing past others waiting to see loved ones - an incident that raised new complaints that the heiress is receiving special treatment."
Not only did Rick and Kathy Hilton jump a line of people who had been waiting hours to see their loved ones, but their very presence slowed the hands of time even further for the less privileged hoi-polloi:
Alvina Floyd, one visitor to the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, waited more than four hours to visit her fiancée. It normally takes two hours, and Floyd, 20, blamed the Hiltons for the delay.
"I have to be at work later," she said. "I can't wait here all day."
Shatani Alverson, 23, said she was hustled out of the jail's visiting room moments after her husband walked in because of the Hiltons. She was told to come back after lunch.
Steve Whitmore, a sheriff's spokesman, said it was routine for high- profile inmates to receive visitors during lunch, a time when the visiting room is normally cleared out and closed.
And while she was at the Lynwood facility, Paris was pampered with extra food and blankets – only this time other prisoners also received these perks to stifle complaints of special treatment. Former inmate Rosemary Gibbons told the New York Daily News: "Since she was here last week, they started giving us double bologna, double apple juices. Two blankets instead of one - and a sheet, too! Everyone has cookies coming out of their pockets. Now we feel like we are in the Hilton Hotel."
In an ABC News interview, Cal State Fullerton political science professor Raphael Sonenshein, said he expects a raft of lawsuits by inmates claiming they were not treated as well as Paris. At least one has already been filed:
[F]ormer county inmate named Pamela Richardson. Richardson, who served 20 days in the Century Regional Detention Center, alleges that sheriff's deputies refused to give her adequate medical treatment while she was in jail.
According to her claim, which is a precursor to a lawsuit, deputies removed Richardson's prosthetic leg and forced her to crawl to the bathroom while in jail. The claim says that Richardson, who is black, received "much worse treatment than Paris Hilton."
It looks like Al Sharpton is going to have a cause célèbre to flog for quite a long time to come.
Did she ask for this treatment? Or did the wardens, out of the goodness of their hearts, seeing her obvious scrawniness, feel the need to feed and swaddle her?
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