"Lost" Star Finds Herself in Jail

Michelle Rodriguez plays a tough girl on TV. Now she has decided to hang tough in real life.

The Lost actress pleaded guilty Tuesday in Hawaii to one count of driving under the influence and chose to pay a $500 fine and spend five days in jail rather than fulfill 240 hours of community service.

Under orders from a Kane'ohe District Court judge, Rodriguez, who plays fierce ex-cop Ana-Lucia Cortez on the show, surrendered to authorities in the early afternoon to begin her short stay in a women's correctional facility on the island of Oahu. Credit for time served will be subtracted from her current sentence.

Producers say the short jail stint won't affect production on the show, which is scheduled to wrap early next month.

Attorney Steve Barta told reporters that his client's decision to serve jail time was "a personal choice."

"I would suspect that because she has a hard time even going out for a meal without being intruded upon for an autograph or photograph, it's really difficult for her to do community service," he said.

Rodriguez's blood-alcohol level was documented as 0.17--more than twice the legal limit--when she was pulled over in the wee a.m. hours of Dec. 2 in Oahu, where Lost is filmed. She posted $500 bail and was arraigned Dec. 29.

While the actress plays an emotionally isolated castaway on Lost, the 27-year-old Rodriguez was not alone during her DUI ordeal. One of her fellow Tailies, Cynthia Watros, was pulled over within 15 minutes of her and registered a 0.10 on the blood-alcohol meter. She was also released after shelling out $500 for bail.

Watros, 37, who plays psychologist Libby on Lost, pleaded guilty in January to a DUI charge and was fined $312, ordered to undergo an alcohol assessment (a test to determine her drinking habits) and sentenced to 14 hours of counseling. Her driver's license was suspended for 90 days, as well.

Rodriguez was eventually charged with two DUI counts because she was serving a three-year probation term stemming from two driving-related incidents in Los Angeles. She pleaded no contest in 2004 to a hit-and-run, driving under the influence and driving with a suspended license, all misdemeanor charges.

The Blue Crush star also completed a three-month alcohol treatment plan as part of her 2004 sentence.

In the interim, Rodriguez has coughed up hundreds of dollars in fines for three separate speeding violations in Hawaii since joining the cast of Lost in 2005.

After her run-in(s) with the Hawaiian law, Los Angeles prosecutors filed a motion in December to have her probation revoked and a hearing is scheduled for May 5. Rodriguez is facing 16 months in jail if the judge grants the request.

As the second season of Lost began, fan sites were filled with reports suggesting Rodriguez's character might not see the light of season three. But when questioned about whether Rodriguez's now-notorious off-camera antics will lead to her being permanently lost, executive producer Damon Lindelof told TVGuide.com that certainly wasn't the case.

"It's all huff and puff and speculation," he said. "Lost's story is the star and no actor would ever be killed off for any other reason than supporting the story."

Now, we'll just have to sit through the two-hour season finale May 24 to see if "the story" supports Ana-Lucia's survival.