'American Idol' Star Antonella Barba Blames Show For Her Criminal Behavior, Facing 10 Years In Prison
American Idol star Antonella Barba says her life went into a downward spiral after appearing on the singing competition.
According to court documents obtained by The Blast, Barba is laying out her case for a short prison sentence with supervisied release in her drug case.
Back in August, Barba plead guilty to a possessing and distributing fentanyl. She reached a plea deal with prosecutors. She is facing 10 years in prison in the case.
She is set to be sentenced on Nov. 21. Barba is asking with the judge to not throw the back at her.
In newly filed court documents, Barba’s lawyer argues, "The extent of Ms. Barba's involvement in this case is limited to delivering one shipment of drugs and that single instance forms the sum total of her relevant conduct."
Further, "Ms. Barba had very little if any insight into the scope and structure of this conspiracy. In fact, prior to receiving the package, she did not know the type of substance or the quantity she was to deliver. Ms. Barba also did not participate in any of the planning or organization nor did she exercise any decision making authority. As indicated above, Ms. Barba's conduct in this offense was limited to this single delivery. That was her sole responsibility; she picked up a package and transported it from one location to another."
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The documents note, "Ms. Barba was told where to go, when to go, and what to do when she got there. She did not break down the contents of the package into smaller amounts for resale and she did not collect any proceeds. She had no pecuniary interest in the package and did not stand to benefit in any way by the sale of the narcotics. Ms. Barba was paid only to deliver the package."
Barba paints herself as a "resilient, deeply religious, selfless, and driven person; someone who could rightfully be called a perfectionist."
Her mother blames American Idol for the downfall. The documents note, "one of the common themes is that the American Idol experience brought about a detrimental change in Ms. Barba's life. For instance, K.J. notes that Ms. Barba's sudden move to Hollywood following American Idol "was a recipe for disaster" and when it came to pass that Ms. Barba was unable to "achieve the results she wanted, it was devastating to her." Likewise, Ms. Barba's mother believes when American Idol happened and "the world intruded and interrupted her . . . dream of a career in architecture" that this is "where it all went wrong."
Barba will learn her prison fate later this month.
In pleading guilty, Barba faces a mandatory minimum term of 10 years in prison, a maximum sentence of life in prison, a fine of $10,000,000, a possible forfeiture of assets, and five years of supervised police.
Barba is scheduled to be sentenced on November 21, 2019. She was allowed to be out on bond awaiting sentencing, as long as she obeyed the court order.
Barba was allegedly one of multiple members of a drug conspiracy that was active in Hampton Roads, Virginia, from late 2017 through the fall of 2018. According to the court documents obtained by The Blast, Barba was attempting to deliver approximately 830.8 grams of fentanyl on the day of her arrest. She also had an additional 400 grams of a "mixture or substance" containing a detectable amount of fentanyl.
Barba was bailed out of jail by her father and had been under home detention with electronic monitoring until an arrest warrant was issued and she was thrown in jail.
Barba appeared on the sixth season of American Idol and made the Top 16 (Jordin Sparks took home the crown). During Barba's run on the show, racy photos of her appeared online, including wet T-shirt pics of her posing in the fountain of the National World War II Memorial.
