Don’t Do The Crime If You Can’t Do The Time

     From the Palm Beach Post:

 A conservative media commentator who was crowned Mrs. Florida 2016 is headed to prison after a federal judge on Thursday said he wanted to send a message that if you steal from the U.S. government, you're going to jail. 

Unless Karyn Turk can convince an appeals court that she doesn't deserve to spend a month behind bars for stealing her elderly mother's Social Security checks instead of using the money to pay for nursing home care, the Highland Beach, Fla., resident must report to prison on March 2. ... 

Since pleading guilty in September to a misdemeanor charge of Social Security fraud, she has been attacked on social media, said her attorney David Tarras. 

Turk, who last year was named champion of the year by Best Buddies, a teen mentoring group, has lost her position on various philanthropic groups, he said. 

The damage to her reputation and her status in political, business and social circles has been enormous, he said. ... 

Without the ability to hob-nob in the community, travel to interview celebrities for YouTube broadcasts and to host fundraisers, like those she held for now convicted political operative Roger Stone, her career is dead, he said. 

"Her livelihood is based on networking and being a social media commentator," Tarras said. 

Besides, he argued, she came to court with a check for $46,000 to reimburse the government for the money she stole. That, he said, should be enough.

Reinhart [the judge] disagreed. While noting that Turk had lived an otherwise law-abiding life and done good works, he said her crime was a serious one. She shouldn't be able to "buy her way out of jail" by simply writing a check, he said. ...