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Amy Fisher out of jail

24-year-old walks right back into glare of the media

By Andrew Metz | Staff Writer

May 11, 1999

Leaving behind the lurid teenhood that riveted a tabloid nation, Amy Fisher walked out of an upstate prison yesterday straight into the media that catapulted her from suburban high-school senior to made-for-TV temptress.

Head down, big black sunglasses hiding her eyes, Fisher, now 24, stepped from the guardhouse at Albion Correctional Facility around 9:20 a.m. Instantly, she was surrounded by about 15 reporters, photographers and cameramen, some of whom had been waiting since sunrise to record the first sighting of the celebrity ex-convict.

Fisher, dressed in a white pullover and ankle-length black skirt, never uttered a word as she was hustled away by her lawyer, mother and publicist into a rented Ford Expedition. A family acquaintance who accompanied the entourage to the airport in Rochester and on the chartered plane to Republic Airport in Farmingdale took pictures of the mother-and-daughter reunion that were distributed to an international photo agency.

Fisher's publicist, Patricia O'Connor, said the controlled distribution of pictures was meant to allow the family privacy and provide the media with images from the long-awaited meeting.

"In giving the media the photographs, the family in turn hopes that the media would give them time to reunite and reacquaint with each other," O'Connor said.

Before her release after seven years in prison, Fisher, who in 1992 shot and injured her lover's wife, Mary Jo Buttafuoco, formerly of Massapequa, told the state parole board she had been hounded by the media and wanted to avoid more publicity.

Her only comments after she was released came in a prepared statement:

"This is the start of a new life for me and my family. Over the last seven years I have had a lot of time to think about what I did. I am sorry. I have learned from my mistakes and I am excited that I have the opportunity to do something positive with my life.

"Right now, I am looking forward to spending time with my family, having dinner with my mom and taking the dog for a walk."

Fisher's lawyer, Bruce Barket of Garden City, declined to say where the family would spend their first days together. He said it isn't Rose Fisher's Long Beach apartment, but somewhere in the New York metropolitan area.

"She is going to take a few days and spend some time with her mom and try to get reacclimated to life," said Barket, who added that mother and daughter looked foward to sharing a private dinner last night. "For seven years they haven't been alone. They have not had one conversation that has not been overheard by someone else."

Barket said Fisher would be living in the New York area with family and starting work at a fashion industry liquidator "relatively soon."

"She needs a few days to unwind and get back into things," he said.

He also said Fisher had no immediate plans to meet with Mary Jo Buttafuoco.

Last month, State Supreme Court Justice Ira Wexner agreed to resentence Fisher to a shorter term. Mary Jo Buttafuoco, who now lives with her husband, Joey, in California, came to Nassau County Court and asked for leniency for Fisher.

Fisher, who was 17 at the time of the shooting, had been having an affair with Joey Buttafuoco, the 38-year-old owner of an auto body shop. He eventually pleaded guilty to statutory rape and served six months in jail.

The affair became the stuff of countless headlines, three television movies and a "My Story" book. And judging by the release, this won't be the last chapter in the saga.

In front of curious inmates staring from prison windows, the gray Expedition carrying Fisher to freedom drove out of Albion, a 10-car media motorcade in tow.