$25,000 for 84 minutes of Lohan

Last year several actresses, among many other entertainers, made a mockery of the legal system. There was Paris Hilton with her whirlwind trips in jail, and Britney Spears who seemed as dangerous to herself as anyone else. And there was the case of Lindsey Lohan.


Lohan was in the middle of her drunken, cocaine addicted, self-destruction phase back in October 2007. It was anything but pretty as the photo above shows.

But she also went to some extremes.

“There is a report out that states Lindsey Lohan has spent at least $7,000,000 solely on drugs, rehab and hotels. Oh, I nearly forgot the lawyers. They got a bit of that roll of bills too.”

One of the more notable events was her arrest after chasing her former assistant in a commandeered car. She was high on cocaine at the time, and plead guilty. Her punishment was an eye-popping 84 minutes in jail. 2 arrests on cocaine possession and she stole a car that had people in it to harasses and endanger 3 other people in another car, and she only spent 84 minutes in jail. Mockery barely touches what this was.

And I addressed that in my other post on this obviously troubled celebrity.

“Isn’t that nice. All the drug charges from 2 arrests within 3 months of each other apparently will not be pursued. They are just going away. I bet you have had that happen to you. I bet you’ve read about similar things happening to your brother/cousin/son/father. I bet the non-famous first-time offending college student with a DUI and a joint let in the car by another student got the same kind of leniency. I’m sure that hundreds of African Americans are treated with the same kid gloves.”

But for all my protest the legal system felt no need to punish the celebrity.

But the 3 men that were in the commandered car, and who were accused by Lohan of possesion of the drugs in Lohan’s pockets, may do more than the legal system has.

The 3 men have filed a lawsuit in excess of $25,000 for the battery, false imprisonment and that the actress was negligent when she allegedly took over the SUV involved in the arrest. This says nothing of her attempts to frame the men on drug charges. I think they asked for too little. And the Lohan camp are facing this lawsuit because for a year they failed to come to a settlement.

If I were on the jury of the civil case I would be pleased to know that this is the chance to hand out a punishment that the law failed to do. I know that juries in the west love to do this. The OJ Simpson case, in L.A. and Vegas, is a prime example of using (civil) law to gain their pound of flesh. And these women, celebrities more for their excesses than any performance they have ever done, need something to cause them to pause.

These men deserve to receive $100,000 each. It’s not like this pop celebrity can’t afford the penalty, or that she hasn’t wasted far more money on extremely more trivial and illegal items.

I hope that this sets a precedence. I hope that assistants assaulted by temperamental supermodel bosses, drunken seemingly brainless socialites scoffing laws, and entertainers that are as addicted and mindless as the zombies found in some of their films all get civil suits for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Because they impact the youth, and there is a respect of law that they should be happy to at least pretend to uphold.

If Lindsey Lohan loses this case it will mean she was penalized $297 for each minute in the jail facility (not even behind bars) that she spent in 2007. Her lawyer likely costs at least that much. But if it prevents even one more celebrity from a drunken, drug fueled spree then it is worth it.