The last

One of the things I do is represent both criminals and just people who are accused of committing a crime.

A recent client is making me crazy. I do not have a problem with people committing crimes, nor do I have a problem with people who commit stupid crimes (after all if there weren't stupid criminals, who would stupid cops arrest, but I digress).

At any rate my client entered a plea to a reduced charge. She was then sentenced to a lock down rehab facility. The reason for the rehab, was that the "crime" (I put crime in quotes because I'm not sure that she was really guilty. However, the deal was so good, what could have happened to her if she went to trial and lost, so bad. That by comparison the deal was quite sweet.)

At any rate she is in a rehab facility for about a month. This is a place where she can wear her own clothes and after a short time have weekend home visits. You need to know that when she was charged, she had no home of her own, her four children were all living with other people, and she had no job. Further, although 30 she had never finished high school. Finally, she reported to me that she was doing a case of beer a day and smoking a lot of dope.

She gets to the rehab and immediately phones me and tells me that she must get out. Both her counselor and I tell her that there is only one other place she can go, that is prison. After a long discussion she seems to get the idea.

A month later I pick up the paper and read that she had climbed the fence and run away. She turned herself in probably less than 24 hours later. We appeared in court on a bond hearing yesterday and she requested that she get out on house arrest. Needless to say the judge was not amused and refused.

She will in all probability now go to prison, in addition there will probably be a new charge of felony escape filed against her and she will probably be convicted of that. I can kind of understand why she escaped, and almost understand why she turned herself in. What I cannot understand is why she seems to think that this entire episode will not nearly automatically result in her going to jail and why she thinks that she will get a different non lock down sentence.