
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, July 31, 1990                   TAG: 9007310406
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

SATIN SHEETS?

ZSA ZSA Gabor has done less than hard time at a slammer in El Segundo, Calif. From her experience, Virginia corrections officials and penologists throughout the country could learn a thing or two about making people pay for their crimes.

Rather than serve her sentence with the riffraff that compose your general jail population, Miss Gabor shopped around until she found a truly chic jail befitting her glamorous status.

Last week, she was driven in a Mercedes to the El Segundo facility - there to spend a three-day sentence that was part of her conviction for slapping a police officer. She was given her choice of private cells and allowed to bring in silk sheets and other homey little touches from her $15 million Bel-Air mansion.

And get this: She paid her jailers $85 a day to be their guest.

Now really, darlinks, this is one swell idea they had out in la-de-dah land.

Build quality jails and prisons that offer those nice amenities that people have come to expect from your better class resorts. Instead of taxpayers having to foot the bill for the incarceration of wrongdoers, the wrongdoers themselves will gladly pay.

There should be a sign right over every lockup that says "Personal checks and all major credit cards accepted."

Oh - and also, of course, "Have a nice day."

by CNB