RISE, A Modern Guide for the Purpose Driven Woman Winter 2014 | Page 41

I took the deal and on May 9, 2009, the Friday before Mothers’ Day, I was sentenced. Not to the original deal but to two 364 day sentences to run concurrent. Jail. Judges hand out a day less than a year to
denote the sentence as “county time” not “state time”. In court the Judge came in looking more like a
beauty queen then me. Full make up, bedazzled robe, the works. She never once made eye contact with
me, choosing instead to address the Jury Box which was filled with media; so many news outlets sent
reporters that day, we were delayed for 2 hours while they set up TVs in the hallway to broadcast the proceedings to the overflow. She ordered me remanded and I was cuffed. The picture is online on google
images everywhere. Me in my Alice & Olivia diamond white suit, head bowed, crying, handcuffed. What
the picture doesn’t show you is the story in my mind; one of feeling deceived and humiliated, not in the
eyes of the world, but in the eyes of my children, still too young to understand that they would face a
future enduring the shame of this day’s sentence imposed on their mother. When the last click and flash
went off, she ordered me, the “Master of Deception”, the worst, most self-centered, devious and deceptive
con-artist she ever had the displeasure of presiding over, to be uncuffed and go home for the month so I
could be with my children until they finished school. She got her sound bites in and then let me leave,
to report back 6/7/2013 at 9am to begin my sentence.
4 million people googled my name that day. I was the 99th most googled person in America. Al Gore’s
son was 100th; he was arrested on a drug charge. I bet no one googled a single one of those 44 soldiers
killed in Iraq. Maybe the media should have focused more on the meaning of their lives then trumping
up the meaning of my story. Funny, my attorney loved to say “Hedy, don’t worry...I’LL GO TO JAIL BEFORE YOU WILL!”. True to his word, Paul Bergrin was arrested two weeks before I went to jail. He was

person in America. Al Gore’s son was 100th; he was arrested on a drug charge.
d have focused more on the meaning of their lives then trumping up the meaning of my story.”
never again a free man. He is currently serving 6 life sentences in federal prison for a host of charges.
The next month was sheer hell. I tried to capture every moment with my sons and hold it all in my
heart and mind. No matter what I did I was villainized still. Their pound of salt had become a mountain. There was no story left, just the hope that the intrigue could still sell a paper or get a blog on top of
Google. After a day in the parks at Disney my sons went back to the room with their Dad and my mom
and I went to the hotel bar; it was my birthday. Someone snapped a photo of me laughing with a martini
in my hand. It was on the internet by the next morning with the caption, “Mrs. NJ, days away from jail,
parties the night away with kids nowhere in site.” It is true, a picture speaks a thousand words, sometimes not a damn one truthful.
I went to jail on 6/7. I served 81 days and was paroled