Although she and billionaire husband, Harry (now 83 and in failing health), once shuttled between their penthouse at the Park Lane Hotel and an estate in Connecticut, the 71-year-old queen manqué may live in humbler quarters after April 15, when she is scheduled to surrender to U.S. marshals. At the Federal Medical Center in Lexington, Ky. (where she reportedly would be housed and would be eligible for parole in 16 months), towels are skimpy, and no one leaves chocolates on the thin pillows.
A woman who once terrorized employees who made the slightest misstep, Helmsley may appreciate the orderliness at her new home. Set on 519 acres in bluegrass country, the prison looks like a college campus, save for the rows of concertina wire inside the fences. Built in 1929, the redbrick residence (home to 1,750 women) is run with admirable precision. Those judged physically able scrub floors or swab toilets. In their own quarters (which are assigned on the basis of seniority and range from 30-bed dormitories to single-person rooms), prisoners are required to be obsessively neat. Guards stage inspections every morning, and untidiness is penalized.
Maintaining her regal mien may be difficult for Helmsley: When she is brought in, she will be strip-searched and fingerprinted. Afterward she will be issued a white blouse and black skirt for "dress" and a pale blue shirt and pants for daywear. She can wear her own bras and briefs, but keeping up the coif will be a problem. The only hairdressers are inmates trained in beauty school, and no tinting is allowed—although some prisoners touch up their hair with Kool-Aid.
What's the secret to success in her new environment? A good attitude will help, says public information officer Janet Jacobson. "If new inmates accept the fact that they're going to be incarcerated, they do better," she says.
Accepting the inevitable, however, has never been Leona's strong suit. Convicted in 1989, she remained free on $25 million bail and brought in high-priced lawyers to argue that she was too fragile to withstand incarceration. On March 18 attorney Sandor Frankel told the court that she had suffered "two or three strokes [and has] severe coronary disease" and claimed that prison would be a "death sentence for Mr. Helmsley." A sobbing Leona told Judge Griesa, "[Harry] has nobody in the world to take care of him and love him. All he's got is me."
Noting that she was a "vigorous woman" who still runs her hotels, Griesa was mildly sympathetic ("I don't know what family wouldn't be affected by someone going to prison") but firm ("That's the consequence of crime"). Intelligent people, he said, get their lives in order in prison. "Do it," he told her. "Get past it."
Between now and April 15, Leona will have time to consider both Griesa's advice and that of Steven Brixey, a Federal Medical Center counselor, who notes that new inmates "need to lose any holier-than-thou attitude." Says Brixey: "We've had numerous people of notoriety here. If they treat people as they'd want to be treated, they're not going to get any grief. But if you have a bad attitude, you're going to get lousy service."
MICHELLE GREEN
BETH AUSTIN in Lexington and MARY HUZINEC in New York City
- Contributors:
- Beth Austin,
- Mary Huzinec.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
