A few weeks ago, Abby Lee Miller resigned as host of Dance Moms.
She is now free from the responsibilities of that Lifetime reality series.
A few hours ago, however, Abby Lee Miller was sentenced to time behind bars for her admitted role in a bankruptcy scheme.
Soon, she will no longer be a free woman.
On Tuesday morning, a federal judge handed down a sentencing of one year and one day to the dancing instructor, following Miller’s official guilty plea last June.
Miller had been indicted on 20 counts of fraud connected to hiding $ 755,000 in earnings from the government over the years.
She filed for Chapter 11 in 2010 and then set up a hidden bank account, into which she deposited vast sums earned from television show appearances and merchandise sales.
She did not disclose these deposits to the government, something she was legally required to do after claiming she was bankrupt.
As a result of her guilty plea last year, Miller was convicted on one count of concealing assets and one count of not reporting an international transaction.
During the sentencing hearing today, she took the stand and begged the judge for mercy, saying she had fallen victim to the sudden fame that came when Dance Moms took off.
But Chief Judge Joy Flowers Conti wasn’t really having it.
He didn’t seem to care very much about the crying defendant in front of him, telling Miller and a packed courtroom:
“You weren’t truthful, even when you knew you were supposed to tell everything, you still weren’t truthful. Somehow you got caught up in the world of fame and you lost your moral compass.”
In addition to her time behind bars, Miller was fined $ 40,000 and ordered to pay $ 120,000 judgement.
Following her jail stint, the ex-reality star will remain on supervised release for two years.
“Throughout this case, Ms. Miller has taken both the allegations and the proceedings very seriously,” Miller’s lawyer, Robert Ridge, previously told People Magazine in a statement.
“This has been a challenging time for Ms. Miller. She appreciates the words of encouragement and support from around the world.”
Over the past few weeks, Miller has granted Entertainment Tonight a number of interviews.
She’s avoided the topic of her impending sentencing, however, choosing to slam her former bosses at Lifetime instead.
“They know how to push my buttons, but it’s gone beyond that, to the point where it is so offensive as a woman,” Miller said of the producers shortly after she quit, adding:
“I think it’s detrimental to my health, to my mental health, to everything. It’s awful. There’s no privacy, there’s no respect.”
Well… Abby better get used to a lack of privacy.
She won’t exactly have it in jail, either.
This is what Miller said about a year ago in court upon admitting her guilt:
“Events over the past several months have been extremely challenging for me, my family, my friends and most important, my students.
“Because of this I made the very difficult decision to close the door on this chapter of my life by accepting responsibility for mistakes I have made along the way.”
While a year as an inmate and a six-figure fine may seem like a lot, Miller really ought to consider herself lucky.
She could have been sentenced to five years and up to $ 5 million in fines.
Sadly, we all know how this is going to end up, don’t we?
Miller is going to jail for basically the same crime as committed by Teresa Giudice.
And she emerged from prison with an even bigger paycheck then she was previously receiving from Bravo, as well as an integral role on The Real Housewives of New Jersey.
We wish we could say that we’ve seen the last of Abby Lee Miller.
But we highly doubt that’s the case.
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