15 Celebrity Legal Cases That Ended With Little or No Jail Time

When a famous person faces serious criminal charges and ends up spending little or no time behind bars, the reaction is usually pretty predictable: Would an ordinary person have gotten the same deal?

Sometimes that is a fair question to ask. It is not, however, something we can answer just by looking at a celebrity's bank account. Plea agreements, prior criminal history, the strength of the evidence, sentencing laws, probation rules, rehabilitation programs, jail overcrowding and prosecutorial discretion can all dramatically change the final outcome of a case.

The cases below are also very different from one another. Some involve guilty pleas or convictions. Others involve reduced charges, deferred adjudication or prosecutors deciding there was not enough evidence to bring a criminal case at all. 24/7 Tempo reviewed court records and reporting from prosecutors, law enforcement agencies and established news organizations to look at notable celebrity legal cases that ended with surprisingly little or no jail time. Inclusion here is not a claim that fame, money or connections improperly influenced the outcome.

Cardi B resolved a years-long criminal case in September 2022 by pleading guilty to third-degree assault and second-degree reckless endangerment, both misdemeanors, stemming from altercations at a Queens strip club in 2018. Ten other counts, including felony charges, were dismissed under the plea agreement. She was sentenced to 15 days of community service and a three-year order of protection for the victims rather than jail. The rapper completed her required community service in 2023.

Roman Polanski's case is different from most on this list because he did not receive a completed light sentence. He left the country before sentencing. In 1977, the director pleaded guilty in Los Angeles to unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor in a case involving a 13-year-old girl. Polanski fled the United States for Europe in 1978 before the judge imposed his sentence. He has remained outside the United States ever since, while efforts to extradite him from countries including Switzerland and Poland have failed. The original California criminal case has never simply gone away.

Justin Bieber was arrested in Miami Beach in January 2014 on suspicion of DUI, resisting arrest and driving without a valid license. His blood-alcohol level was measured at 0.014, below Florida's 0.02 limit for drivers under 21, although a urine test detected marijuana and the anti-anxiety medication alprazolam. Bieber ultimately pleaded guilty to misdemeanor careless driving and resisting arrest without violence. The DUI case did not result in a conviction. His plea agreement included a 12-hour anger-management course, a $500 fine and a $50,000 charitable contribution, with no jail time.

Karl Malone's entry is another important outlier because there was never a criminal prosecution. Reporting based on court records found that Malone was 20 when 13-year-old Gloria Bell became pregnant in Louisiana and later gave birth to Demetress Bell. No criminal charges were filed. Years later, the Bell family pursued Malone through paternity and child-support proceedings. Malone initially challenged a court order requiring child support, and the dispute was eventually resolved in a confidential settlement. He later acknowledged Demetress and developed a relationship with him. Because no criminal case was brought, there was never a criminal sentence or potential jail term for a court to impose.

Matthew Broderick was driving a rented car in Northern Ireland in August 1987 when his vehicle crossed into the opposing lane and collided head-on with another car. Anna Gallagher, 28, and her mother, Margaret Doherty, 63, were killed. Police initially charged Broderick with a much more serious driving offense that carried the possibility of prison time. In February 1988, however, his lawyer entered a guilty plea on his behalf to the lesser offense of careless driving. Broderick was fined £100, roughly $175 at the time, and received no jail sentence.

Mötley Crüe frontman Vince Neil was driving drunk in Redondo Beach, California, on Dec. 8, 1984, when his car collided head-on with another vehicle. His passenger, Hanoi Rocks drummer Nicholas "Razzle" Dingley, died, while two people in the other car were seriously injured. Neil pleaded guilty to vehicular manslaughter and drunk driving. In 1985, a judge sentenced him to 30 days in county jail, five years of probation and 200 hours of community service and ordered him to pay $2.6 million in restitution. It was an unusually short jail sentence for a crash that killed one person and badly injured two others, although the financial restitution and probation requirements were substantial.

Charlie Sheen pleaded guilty in August 2010 to misdemeanor third-degree assault stemming from a Christmas Day 2009 domestic dispute with his then-wife, Brooke Mueller, in Aspen, Colorado. Prosecutors dropped a felony menacing charge and a criminal-mischief charge as part of the agreement. Sheen was sentenced to 30 days in a rehabilitation facility, 30 days of probation and 36 hours of anger-management treatment. He did not receive a jail sentence under the final deal.

Long before Jon Hamm became famous, he was implicated in a violent 1990 fraternity hazing incident while attending the University of Texas. Court and school records later obtained by the Associated Press showed that Hamm was charged with hazing and received deferred adjudication. That meant he had to complete probation but was not ultimately convicted of the hazing charge. A separate assault charge was dismissed. The Sigma Nu chapter involved in the incident permanently disbanded. Because Hamm was an unknown college student at the time, this case is also a good reminder that not every unusual legal outcome involving a future celebrity can be blamed on celebrity status.

Lindsay Lohan's legal problems generated years of tabloid coverage, but one of the most memorable sentencing disputes came in 2010. A Los Angeles County judge sentenced her to 90 days in jail and 90 days in drug rehabilitation for violating probation connected to her 2007 DUI case. She ultimately served 13 days behind bars before being released under county policies that reduced time for nonviolent offenders because of jail overcrowding and good behavior. Lohan then spent 23 days in inpatient rehabilitation before doctors recommended her release into outpatient treatment. Her dramatically shortened jail stay attracted plenty of attention, but Los Angeles officials said the early-release rules were routinely applied to nonviolent inmates.

Late on July 18, 1969, Sen. Ted Kennedy drove a car off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts. His passenger, 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne, died in the submerged vehicle. Kennedy did not report the crash to police until the following morning, roughly 10 hours later. Contrary to a claim that has followed the case for decades, authorities never established that Kennedy was legally intoxicated at the time because the delay meant no timely blood-alcohol test was performed. Kennedy pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident and received a two-month suspended jail sentence. His driver's license was also suspended for a year.

Caitlyn Jenner was involved in a four-vehicle crash on Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu in February 2015 that killed 69-year-old Kim Howe. Jenner's SUV struck vehicles ahead of her, and Howe's Lexus was pushed into oncoming traffic, where it was hit by another vehicle. Sheriff's investigators submitted the case to prosecutors for possible misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter, but the Los Angeles County district attorney's office declined to file charges. Prosecutors said the available evidence was not enough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Jenner had driven unreasonably. They noted that she had been traveling slightly below the speed limit and had applied her brakes before the collision. This was therefore a decision not to prosecute, not a conviction followed by a light sentence.

Jonathan Majors was convicted by a Manhattan jury in December 2023 of misdemeanor reckless assault and harassment involving his former girlfriend Grace Jabbari. He was acquitted of two other counts that required prosecutors to prove intentional conduct. In April 2024, a judge gave Majors a conditional discharge and ordered him to complete a 52-week, in-person domestic violence intervention program along with continued therapy. He received no jail time. The judge noted that Majors was a first-time offender and that both the prosecution and defense agreed incarceration was not necessary. Majors later completed the court-ordered counseling program.

Justin Timberlake was arrested in Sag Harbor, New York, in June 2024 after police said he ran a stop sign and failed to maintain his lane. He was initially charged with driving while intoxicated. In September, Timberlake pleaded guilty to the lesser offense of driving while ability impaired, which is a traffic violation rather than a misdemeanor crime under New York law. He was ordered to pay a $500 fine and $260 surcharge, complete 25 hours of community service and make a public safety announcement about impaired driving. His driver's license was also suspended for 90 days.

Country star Morgan Wallen was arrested in Nashville in April 2024 after police said he threw a chair from the roof of a six-story bar. According to the arrest affidavit, the chair landed only about three feet from two police officers standing on Broadway below. Wallen ultimately pleaded guilty in December 2024 to two misdemeanor counts of reckless endangerment. He was sentenced to seven days at a DUI education center and two years of supervised probation rather than jail. His attorney said the charges could become eligible for dismissal and expungement after he successfully completes probation.

Ezra Miller resolved a Vermont criminal case in January 2023 by pleading guilty to misdemeanor unlawful trespass. Police had accused the actor of entering a neighbor's home in 2022 and taking bottles of alcohol while the homeowner was away. Under the plea agreement, prosecutors dismissed a felony burglary charge and a misdemeanor larceny charge. Miller received an 89-to-90-day suspended jail sentence, a $500 fine and one year of probation, with conditions that included continued mental health treatment. As long as the probation conditions were followed, Miller did not have to serve the suspended jail term.