Posted on 07/05/2005 10:23:45 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
NEW YORK (AP) - Martha Stewart says in a new interview that her nickname in prison was M. Diddy, that house arrest is "hideous" and that her prosecution was about bringing her down "to scare other people."
In the interview, Stewart tells Vanity Fair magazine she agrees with those who say her crime - lying about a personal stock sale - is far different from massive corporate scandals such as Enron, WorldCom and Tyco.
"Of course that is what it's all about," Vanity Fair quotes Stewart as saying. "Bring 'em down a notch, to scare other people. If Martha can be sent to jail, think hard before you sell that stock."
Stewart, 63, is serving a five-month term of house arrest at her Bedford, N.Y., estate that followed five months in a West Virginia federal prison. She is scheduled to go free early next month.
"I hate lockdown. It's hideous," Stewart tells the August issue of the magazine, on newsstands July 12.
Asked about the electronic monitoring device she must wear on her ankle - she has complained repeatedly that it irritates her skin - Stewart says she knows how to remove it.
"I watched them put it on. You can figure out how to get it off," she is quoted as saying. "It's on the Internet. I looked it up."
Her publicist's eyes "widened with alarm" when Stewart made the remark. The article didn't say whether Stewart claimed ever to have taken off the device.
Still, Stewart appears to take house arrest very seriously, noting that she once phoned her probation officer to apologize when she arrived home two or three minutes late from an approved outing.
Stewart has two TV shows planned for the fall season - a one-hour daytime talk show "Martha" and a version of the NBC reality show "The Apprentice."
She says her version of "The Apprentice" will be different than Donald Trump's and that she doesn't want to be portrayed as mean and harsh. She says she would never use Trump's catchphrase, "You're fired."
"We are trying to come up with other ways to say it," she says. "For instance, if someone is from Idaho, I could say, 'You're back in Boise for apple-picking time.'"
A federal appeals court is considering Stewart's bid to overturn her conviction on charges that she lied about her sale of 3,928 shares of ImClone Systems stock in late 2001.
Asked whether she owes anyone an apology, Stewart says she is sorry for the "chaos" her prosecution caused but suggests she is not personally to blame.
"You can't be sorry for something that - let's see, how can I say this? I'm on appeal. You don't appeal if you think that you should be sorry," she says.
The magazine reports Stewart is in good spirits and hard at work renovating her Bedford home. She is allowed to leave Bedford 48 hours per week for work outings.
She even laughs at a joke made by Jon Stewart of "The Daily Show" - that she could make a shiv, or small blade, out of a lamb shank.
"He was talking about me after I left, and - I have to say - Jon Stewart is even better looking in person than he is on TV," Stewart says. "I have such a crush on him."
Since Waksal, who is serving seven years, I believe, was the "insider" it only makes sense that Martha was not going to be charged for "insider trading".
What is pretty obvious is that Martha gained I think fifty thousand dollars by selling stock to investors who would have had no idea that the stock price was going to plummet the next day because of information that Waksal had and Stewart probably heard. You can believe that Stewart only made that money by accident but I don't. If a person expects to make such gains by accident then they need to be up front about what they knew and when they knew it. I wish that you had been the one to buy the stock from Stewart. You might have a different appreciation for the laws intended to protect investors.
You don't believe that Waksal was innocent of wrong-doing, do you?
No one said what she did was the equivalent of the "massive corporate scandals," that's why different crimes warrant different penalties. Spitting on the sidewalk is not the same as first degree murder, either, Martha, but it's still against the law.
Dear garyhope,
"I know she wasn't prosecuted for insider trading, but she engaged in it."
So the federal government would like us to believe.
But they were unwilling to prosecute her for it, I suppose because they knew they couldn't make the case.
As for prosecutors who decide to prosecute people because those people are perceived as "smug and arrogance," to me, that is the real smuggness and arrogance, that the decisions would be based on those perceptions. No one has an obligation to be nice to the feds. Last time I looked, we paid the taxes, they cashed the checks drawn on those taxes.
We are not serfs or slaves, to bow down to our federal masters. If they can't handle someone with an unpleasant personality, instead of immorally using their power to crush such persons, they ought to go do that for which they're qualified - hauling away dog crap.
I truly did not like Martha Stewart before all this began. To me, the worst part of this entire debacle is that the immoral treatment of her by the stupid, power-mad federal prosecutors has actually made me feel sorry for her.
Sorry for Martha Stewart! Argh!
sitetest
Perhaps you misunderstood my reply or I din't explain my self adequately or coherently enough.
I agree with you the government's prosecution of her was arrogant, pointless and wrong and a waste of time and money.
I was talking about the government's motivation to prosecute her, not the validity of their case.
I have mixed or dual feelings about Ms. Stewart. She's a talented and very hard worker who deserves her success due to her hard work, but there may be a certain karmic reaction due to her arrogance or hubris whether you or I agree or disagree with it or not.
I've bought and sold MSO shares and made money on it, so in that respect, I like her.
Dear garyhope,
"I was talking about the government's motivation to prosecute her, not the validity of their case."
It is this to which I was replying.
"...but there may be a certain karmic reaction due to her arrogance or hubris whether you or I agree or disagree with it or not."
That clarifies your remarks. Gotcha.
Nonetheless, the govt buffoons who did this should still all be boiled in oil.
sitetest
Bingo. Judge couldn't have said it better.
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