Jail for non-violent rich peeps

From the J-Walk blog:

If you get thrown into the slammer in California, you might be able to buy your way into luxury accommodations: For $82 a Day, Booking a Cell in a 5-Star Jail.

Anyone convicted of a crime knows a debt to society often must be paid in jail. But a slice of Californians willing to supplement that debt with cash (no personal checks, please) are finding that the time can be almost bearable.

For offenders whose crimes are usually relatively minor (carjackers should not bother) and whose bank accounts remain lofty, a dozen or so city jails across the state offer pay-to-stay upgrades. Theirs are a clean, quiet, if not exactly recherche alternative to the standard county jails, where the walls are bars, the fellow inmates are hardened and privileges are few.

For roughly $75 to $127 a day, these convicts - who are known in the self-pay parlance as "clients" - get a small cell behind a regular door, distance of some amplitude from violent offenders and, in some cases, the right to bring an iPod or computer on which to compose a novel, or perhaps a song.

Recherche??

Read more here -- includes a pic of someone in their "recherche" cell.