Hotel heiress Paris Hilton back to jail

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Hotel heiress Paris Hilton

Hotel heiress Paris Hilton was taken from a Los Angeles courtroom screaming and crying on Friday, seconds after a judge ordered her returned to jail to serve out her entire 45-day sentence for a probation violation in a reckless driving case.

"It's not right!" shouted the weeping Hilton. The socialite, who was brought to court in handcuffs in a sheriff's car, came into the courtroom dishevelled and weeping.

AP reporter Linda Deutsch was in the court room and reported on events inside. "During the hearing she was shivering the whole time. Her whole body seemed to shake all the time and she was very unhappy when the judge finally ordered her back to jail," Deutsch said. "She was trying to go toward her parents but the deputies took her by the arms and steered her out of the court room," she added.

Deputies escorted Hilton out of the room, holding each of her arms as she looked back. The 26-year-old was taken to a correctional treatment centre at the downtown Twin Towers jail for medical and psychiatric examination to determine which facility she would be held in, a sheriff's spokesman said.

She was expected to be there for a couple of days, he said. Despite being re-incarcerated to serve out the remainder of her sentence, Hilton could still be released early. Inmates are given a day off their terms for every four days of good behaviour and her days in home detention counted as custody days.

During the hearing on the issue of her early release, Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer was calm but apparently irked by developments earlier in the day. He said he had left the courthouse on Thursday night having signed an order for Hilton to appear for the hearing. When he got in his car early on Friday, he said, he heard a radio report that she would not appear and that he had approved a telephonic hearing. He said no such thing had been approved by him.

The hearing was requested by the city attorney's office, which had prosecuted Hilton and wanted Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca held in contempt for deciding to reassign Hilton to home detention, despite the judge's express order that she must serve her time in jail.

A member of the county counsel's staff said that Baca was concerned with Hilton's medical condition and was willing to come to court with medical personnel to meet with the judge. The judge did not take him up on the offer. The judge also took no action on the contempt request.

Hilton's attorney implored the judge to order a hearing in his chambers at which he would hear testimony about Hilton's medical condition before making a decision. The judge did not respond to that suggestion.