Stewart Asks to Start Prison Sentence
Fluff the pillows and tuck in the bedsheets: Martha Stewart says she’s ready to go to prison, and the sooner the better.
The home-design entrepreneur asked a federal judge Wednesday to allow her to begin her sentence right away, saying she wanted to put her prison time behind her so she could get on with her life and career.
Stewart insists she is innocent and is pressing ahead with an appeal of her criminal obstruction-of-justice conviction. But the only way to end her “immense agony” and position herself for a potential return to her company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc., was to begin her sentence as soon as possible, she said at a Manhattan news conference.
Recent delays in her case mean her appeal won’t be considered until next year, her lawyer said.
“I suppose the best word to use for this very harsh and difficult decision is ‘finality,’ and my intense desire and need to put this nightmare behind me both personally and professionally,” Stewart said. “I must reclaim my good life.”
Stewart said she hoped to be out by March -- in time “to plant the new spring garden and to truly get things growing again.”
Legal experts said Stewart’s decision was driven by a paucity of options. Her appeal is unlikely to succeed, they said, and even if it does, she is likely only to be granted a new trial. That could delay a return to her company until next year or beyond.
“You can beat your chest and say, ‘I’m innocent,’ all you want,” said Gene Murphy, a white-collar defense lawyer at Bryan Cave in Chicago. But that “would just continue to damage her reputation and her business until she had a definitive resolution. That’s what this is all about, a definitive resolution.”
Stewart’s future role at the company she founded is uncertain. She stepped down from the company’s board and gave up her chief creative officer title shortly after her conviction. Her current designation is founding editorial director.
Thomas Siekman, the board chairman, said no conclusion had been reached.
“We don’t have definite plans” about what she would do after her release, he said.
Stewart asked to be sent to prison in Danbury, Conn., near her home in northern Westchester County, N.Y., so her 90-year-old mother could visit. Her second choice is a facility in Coleman, Fla.
Stewart could be behind bars in a matter of weeks.
U.S. District Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum, who will set the sentence start date, must first grant the request. After that, it would take about two weeks for the Federal Bureau of Prisons to tell Stewart where she would be incarcerated, a bureau spokesman said.
In contrast to the dour visage that Stewart displayed throughout her trial, her demeanor Wednesday was upbeat.
She grew teary-eyed and her voice cracked at one point. But she composed herself quickly and declared that “despite what you all might think, I do have a sense of humor.” She then joked about how a businessman who saw her on the street recently said to his colleagues, “Oh, she’s out already.”
A federal jury in March found Stewart guilty of conspiracy, obstruction of justice and two counts of lying to investigators stemming from the December 2001 sale of her 3,928 shares of ImClone Systems Inc., a biotechnology company founded by her friend Samuel D. Waksal.
Cedarbaum sentenced Stewart to the minimum sentence proscribed by federal guidelines -- five months in prison, another five months in home detention and two years’ probation. Cedarbaum allowed her to remain free pending her appeal.
Stewart’s attorney, Walter Dellinger, maintained that she had a “very strong” appeal and that her request was driven solely by a desire to get the case behind her.
On Wednesday, shares of Martha Stewart Living rose 12 cents to $11.26 on the New York Stock Exchange.
