Boy George's Rubbish Sentence

Mon., Jul. 31, 2006 12:10 PM PDT by Gina Serpe

Come next month, Lindsay Lohan may not be the only celeb suffering from heat exhaustion.

Boy George is set to carry out his five days of court-ordered community service with New York's sanitation department--starting Aug. 14 he'll spend his time tidying up city streets.

Apparently, they really do want to hurt him.

The former Culture Club crooner was sentenced to garbage patrol after pleading guilty to falsely reporting a burglary at his Manhattan apartment last October.

"This is the epitome of community service," Vito Turso, the sanitation department spokesman told the New York Daily News. "It's not like he's going to be working in an air-conditioned office.

Once the '80s pop icon, whose real name is George O'Dowd, is issued his plastic gloves and garbage bags, he will, Turso tells would-be looky-loos, likely end up on the streets of Chinatown, Little Italy or the Lower East Side.

"They go where we could use the assistance most--high-traffic areas need a lot of street sweeping," Turso told the Daily News. "We also send them to vacant lots and to sweep sidewalks."

The "Karma Chameleon" singer was initially slated to begin his service Aug. 7 but was granted a one week reprieve to work the sentence around his concert schedule abroad. Between court hearings, George has been performing small gigs around London.

Last month, the flamboyant singer received a public scolding (see, he has something else in common with Lohan) from Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Anthony Ferrara after failing to show at hearing to discuss why conditions of his probation--his community service and payment of a $1,000 fine--had yet to be completed.

"This is a simple matter," Ferrara said at the time. "Five days of community service. It's up to you as to whether it will be an exercise in humiliation or an exercise in humility."

The judge also warned the entertainer that if he does not served his full five day sentence by Aug. 28, he would be jailed.

Last October, New York's finest responded to a report of a burglary at George's Manhattan apartment and in lieu of an actual break-in, found 13 plastic bags of cocaine. The singer denied that the drugs were his, claiming one of his frequent guests must have left them behind.

In March, he finally changed his story and struck a deal with the D.A. to plead guilty to a lesser charge of a third-degree false reporting of an incident.