Lauryn Hill was released from federal prison on Friday evening, after spending three months at the facility for a tax evasion conviction.
Hill, a former member of the Fugees, was sentenced in July to prison for failure to pay taxes on money earned from 2005 until 2007. While she is no longer in prison, the singer will have to spend three months under home confinement .
The singer’s attorney, Nathan Hochman, left the prison in Connecticut with his client on Friday. Hochman also released a statement about the event, saying:
“[Lauryn Hill] was released several days early based on a number of factors the Bureau of Prisons takes into consideration, including good behavior.”
Hochman added that Hill already paid the taxes she owed in relation to her case . He noted that he hasn’t had a chance to speak with his client since she was released.
According to her lawyer, Lauryn Hill also began her one-year period of supervised probation upon her release Friday. In online postings and at her sentencing hearing, the singer explained that she stopped paying taxes after she dropped out of the music industry. She added that she did so to protect herself and her children.
However, Hill’s explanation didn’t sit well with the judge presiding over her trial, who reminded her that individual citizens don’t decide when they will pay the government.
To show that she hasn’t been idle during her time in prison, the former Fugees singer released a new song called “Consumerism” the same day as her release. The song was linked to her Tweeter feed and the singer explained that “she wanted to get this music out while she was incarcerated, as it is a product of the space she was in while she was going through some of the challenges she has been faced with recently.”
Lauryn Hill compared her time in the music business to slavery her ancestors experienced.
