I don’t agree - paradise and heaven are one in the same -
“The story of the penitent thief has sometimes been considered the most surprising, the most suggestive, the most instructive incident in all the Gospel narrative. ... In the salvation of one of the thieves theology finds one of its finest demonstrations.
Sacrementalism was refuted, for the thief was saved without recourse to baptism, the Lord’s Supper, church, ceremony, or good works.
The dogma of purgatory was refuted, for this vile sinner was instantly transformed into a saint and made fit for paradise apart from his personal expiation of a single sin.
The teaching of universalism was refuted, for only one was saved of all who might have been saved. Jesus did not say, “Today shall ye be with me in paradise”, but “Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.”
The notion of soul-sleep was refuted, for the clear implication of the entire incident is that the redeemed thief would be in conscious fellowship with his Saviour in paradise even while his body disintegrated in some grave.
Too, it is doubtful whether any other gospel incident presents the plan of salvation more clearly or simply.” —Dr. Charles R. Erdman)
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For clearly he was baptized, just not with water.
The equivalent sacramental baptism of water, which in God's providence is sufficient to enable a person to obtain the state of grace and to save his or her soul. According to the Church's teaching, "Those who through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do His will as they know it through the dictate of their conscience -- those too may achieve eternal salvation" (Second Vatical Council, Constitution on the Church, I, 16).
Martyrdom in the case of a person who died for the Christian faith before he or she could receive the sacrament. The effects of martyrdom of blood are the complete remission of sin and the title to immediate entrance into heaven. The expression entered the Christian vocabulary during the first three centuries when many catechumens awaiting baptism and pagans suddenly converted to the Christian faith were martyred before they could receive formal baptism of water.