Martha: Bring On The Bars!

SEPTEMBER 15--Martha Stewart today told a federal judge that she wants to immediately begin serving her five-month prison term, claiming that the "uncertain duration of the appellate process" was having a detrimental effect on her company. In a letter to Judge Miriam Cedarbaum, lawyer Walter Dellinger stated that if Stewart could now check into the federal pen, she would be able to eliminate the "prevailing uncertainty" as to "when she will be able to resume fully her vital contributions" to her firm, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. Since her first choice of federal prison camp--the one in Danbury, Connecticut--is overbooked, Stewart wants to spend her sentence at a Bureau of Prisons facility in Coleman, Florida. The Sunshine State lockup, Dellinger noted, is preferable to a prison camp in West Virginia because it is closer to air and rail transport, which will make visits by Stewart's 90-year-old mother easier. And while Team Martha didn't mention it, the balmy central Florida weather (average winter high: 71.2 degrees) sure beats the chilly Mountaineer air (average winter high: 41.2 degrees). (3 pages)