I wish we had an “ironic” tag, because that is exactly what this story should be filed under. While a lot of prison inmates spend their time lifting weights, bulking up, or working in the prison’s pottery studio, vehicular manslaughterer and former “Prison Break” star Lane Garrison spends his time in the slammer watching… “Prison Break.” You see the gentle irony. He also pens letters to “Access Hollywood” - though to be fair, most of us update Pat O’Brien on our comings and goings at least once a week. Here’s a little excerpt.

“Greetings and Happy New Year to you and everyone at Access Hollywood from Donovan State Prison [in California]. Never did I think I would be saying the words ‘happy & prison’ in the same sentence and not be on a set. It’s pure irony coming from the show and now living the real deal. It’s surreal and mind-blowing to say the least.

“Just this past Monday they let a group of inmates watch the season premiere of Prison Break. It felt like an out of body experience as I stood around a crowd of tattooed felons watching Michael Scofield [Wentworth Miller’s character on Prison Break] try to escape … all of us longing to be free as well!

“This has been the hardest year of my life. I hope people, young and old, are learning from my mistakes and what can happen when you drink and drive. I have much to say about the pain I’ve felt and seen inside of prison. It has been eye-opening and a harrowing experience.”

[From Us Weekly]

You know who else it’s been a hard year for Lane? The family of the 17-year-old boy you killed when you drank too much and crashed your car. I’m guessing what they’ve gone through is a hell of a lot worse than prison. Plus they have to deal with it for the rest of their lives, whereas you just have a measly 40 month sentence. I know you said something about learning from his mistake, but make some little mention of the boy you killed, or at least his family. I realize we’re supposed to either feel badly for him or at least think he’s learned something, but I’m just not buying it. But I do enjoy the irony, and hope Lane gets to partake in a few of those other stereotypical prison activities.

Prison Break star Lane Garrison is serving 40 months in prison for a drunken car crash in which a 17 year-old passenger in his car was killed. He plead guilty to felony vehicular manslaughter and DUI and could get out in a year and half on good behavior.

Jessica Simpson knows Garrison well and he is said to be like a brother to her. They are the same age and grew up near each other in Texas. Garrison even lived with Jessica’s family for a year when he was 17. Her father, Joe, was his minister and he was a troubled teen when he was sent to live with the Simpsons.

Jessica was said to be devastated when she learned that Garrison caused a car crash which resulted in a teen’s death. Her terrible performance at the Dolly Parton tribute at the Kennedy Center is rumored to be due to her heartache at learning of Garrison’s accident right before she went on stage.

Jessica has tried to make Garrison’s stay behind bars a little more bearable. She sent him 12 inch color TV to keep him company in the slammer. Former TV star Garrison is supposedly broke after lawyer’s fees and must have appreciated the gesture:

Christmas came early for former Prison Break star Lane Garrison - his good pal Jessica Simpson bought him a 12 inch color TV!… Permission to get a TV was granted to Lane, 27, for good behavior and Jessica… was happy to make is happen. “Lane’s broke,” his pal explains. “He didn’t have enough money to buy a TV, so Jessica was nice enough to send him one for the holidays.”

[From In Touch, print edition, January 7, 2008]

Doesn’t a 12 inch television sound small? Flat panels go for around $120 so Garrison must be really scrapped if he can’t afford one. Maybe Simpson thought that anything bigger than a 12 inch would have drawn attention to Garrison, or it’s possible he didn’t have permission to get a bigger TV.

After his drunk and drug-fueled accident Garrison recorded a tearful public service announcement to warn of the dangers of driving drunk, wrote a long letter to the court apologizing and taking responsibility for his actions, and personally apologized in court to the family of the 17 year-old teen who was killed in the accident he caused, Vahagn Setian. His sister also wrote a letter to the judge in which she described a very difficult childhood in which their father was either absent or abusive towards them. She said that her brother was “near suicidal” and “despondent” after the fatal car crash. Jail time is more than warranted in this case, but Garrison also seems genuinely affected and remorseful. He’ll have to live with his actions for the rest of his life.

Lane Garrison got just about half the maximum sentence for his drunken/drug fueled car crash that killed a teenager last December. He was sentenced to forty months, just about half of the six years and eight months he could have received. He’s been in jail for three months so far and will get credit for time served. If he behaves himself, he could be out in twenty months – not much for killing a person.

Garrison pleaded guilty in May to felony vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence in the deadly accident that took 17-year-old Vahagn Setian’s life and injured two 15-year-old girls.

Following his plea, Garrison was ordered in August to undergo a 90-day diagnostic stay at the California Institute for Men in Chino.

He completed the psychological evaluation last month and was turned over to Los Angeles County authorities. Since then, he has been incarcerated at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility while awaiting sentencing.

The actor’s legal team had pushed for him to be released on probation, but Superior Court Judge Elden S. Fox felt a stricter penalty was in order.

[From E! News]

Maybe it’s just me – that doesn’t seem like much of a penalty. Several of the articles I’ve read today have stupid titles like “Not much of a prison break for Garrison.” Vehicular manslaughter really should have a higher maximum sentence. I can’t believe they didn’t add some charges for the alcohol/drug aspect of the crime. I’m not sure if this is celebrity justice or just crappy justice that anyone could get, but I really hope terrible things happen to this guy in his cell. Though because he’s famous, he probably will be kept in isolation, so that will make his time feel a hell of a lot longer. And that makes me a little bit happier.

Picture note by Jaybird: Here’s Lane before the crash at the Prison Break - End of Season Screening Party on April 27th, 2006. Image thanks to PR Photos.

Prison Break star Lane Garrison has been sentenced to 90 days in state prison for evaluation by state officials and experts to see if he can be put on probation rather than face extended jail time for a DUI crash last December, in which a 17 year-old boy he had just met died after Garrison’s car hit a tree. Garrison’s blood alcohol level was .20 that night and he tested positive for cocaine. Garrison was doing 40 in a 25 mph zone before the accident.

In May, Garrison entered a guilty plea for DUI and vehicular manslaughter. The judge has delayed official sentencing, and says he must have 90 days of “diagnostic” evaluation.

Depending on the outcome of the evaluation, Garrison could get up to six years and eight months in jail.

While Garrison says the teens approached him at a grocery store to buy them alcohol, two of the surviving witnesses in the car, 15 year-old Michelle Ohana and Chen Sagi, testified he was the one who offered to buy them booze first.

The teens then took Garrison to a party, where he was said to reveal a bottle of Grey Goose vodka “with a flourish.” According to witnesses, Garrison did several shots at the party, and went out with the two girls he met at the grocery store to get more alcohol. They are said to have been concerned that he was too drunk to drive, and to have asked their friend, 17 year-old Vahagn Setian, to accompany them. It was during that drive that Garrison lost control of his 2001 Range Rover, killing Setian and seriously injuring the two other passengers.

At the trial, Garrison made a public apology to the family of the young man he killed, looking right at them and saying “No family should have to sit where you are sitting…. I just want to apologize to you guys and the court, and to every young person that’s here.” [Most details from LA Times.]

Garrison also recorded a tearful Public Service announcement, in which he appeared truly sorry and upset over the death he caused.

The family of the man whose life was so carelessly cut short were understandably unimpressed. Setian’s father said “There can be no doubt … he is reckless, he is careless, and above all, he is selfish.” He also said that Garrison could have apologized right away, but he took his time about it and did not do it in person.

A friend of Vahagn Setian wears a t-shirt in memorial of the slain 17 year-old outside the Beverly Hills courthouse. Picture and description from MSNBC.

Setian also said that Garrison is an actor, and that the public service announcement pissed him off. “He is an actor. He is acting. He killed a human being and he killed our son.” [Details from TMZ]

There were about 12 friends and relatives of slain 17 year-old Vahagn Setian at Garrison’s court hearing yesterday wearing T-shirts with Vahagn’s picture on them. The shirts had a James Dean quote on the back “Dream as if you’ll live forever, live as if you’ll die today”

It is possible that the judge was persuaded to take his time in sentencing by the impassioned letters written to him by Garrison and his younger sister, Amelia. Amelia described a horrific childhood with Lane, in which their father was either drunk and abusive or absent, and their mother was usually in the hospital. Both of their parents are now deceased, and Garrison’s sister says she would not be where she is today were it not for her caring brother. She now works for a producer at Walt Disney studios.

Amelia begged the judge not to send him away for a long time and said that Garrison was “despondent” and “near suicidal” after the accident.

Garrison’s letter to the judge is similarly moving. He said that he takes full responsibility for the accident and that he is “ashamed” and “enternally sorry.” He said “My heart breaks for the suffering they [the Setians] are forced to endure because of my atrocious actions.”

In his concluding paragraph he says he prays all the time and hopes that somehow he can ease the Setian’s pain. He also prays that the judge “can see my true character, heart and who I really am, not the character I portrayed on tv or who the media has deemed I am.” He says he is “extremely remorseful and grieving” and that he realizes “what horrible, inexcusable mistakes he made that night.” [Details from PDF files available on TMZ]

The guy really does sound devastated by what happened, but he killed someone while driving drunk with young passengers in his car. Jail time seems necessary and warranted in this case. It’s a sad story all around and a real lesson that there’s never a reason to drive after you’ve been drinking.

There’s plenty of news lately about celebrities causing fatal car accidents. Prison Break star Lane Garrison went with some teen fans to a party in December and attempted to drive them home. He then rammed his SUV into a tree, killing a 17 year-old boy he just met that night. He was driving drunk, and now there’s evidence that he was doing cocaine before the crash:

Blood tests have revealed that Lane Garrison had “more than twice the legal limit” of alcohol in his system and was under the influence of cocaine during the fatal crash that killed a 17-year-old boy in December, this according to police.

A spokesman for the Beverly Hills Police Department announced today that his department has recommend that the L.A. County District Attorney file a felony charge of gross vehicular manslaughter against the “Prison Break” star….

TMZ spoke exclusively with several witnesses who claim they watched Lane Garrison snort lines of cocaine just before the fatal crash.

According to our sources, Garrison looked “very high” and his “eyes were glazed” at the the party, which was attended mostly by teenagers.

According to our sources, Garrison obtained the coke from another attendee in an upstairs bedroom of the Beverly Hills home where seven or eight people were partying. They report that Garrison also had six or seven shots of Grey Goose vodka at the same time.

This is Garrison’s second known accident. He rear-ended a car at a light after leaving LA celebrity club Hyde in October of last year.

Garrison could get up to ten years in jail if he’s convicted on the charge of gross vehicular manslaughter. It’s doubtful his role as the now-deceased Tweener on Prison Break has prepared him for the real experience.