It's enough to make us take up a life of crime. A judge in Illinois recently offered to reduce a fine from $150 (£75) to $35 (£17) if the defendant agreed to listen to classical music for 20 hours.
Andrew Vactor was facing a hefty penalty for noise violations, after playing hip-hop loudly on his car stereo this summer. But long-named Champaign County Municipal Court Judge Susan Fornof-Lippencott offered to cut the fine by almost 80% if Vactor agreed to endure a 20-hour Beethoven listening party.
Vactor quickly agreed, but could only stand 15 minutes of the old Ludwig Van, according to the Associated Press.
The defendant had a hard time facing the music. "I didn't have the time to deal with that," he said. "I just decided to pay the fine."
Fornof-Lippencott said that she wanted to teach Vactor what it's like to listen to music he doesn't like, just as Vactor forced others to listen to the booming bass lines from his car. "I think a lot of people don't like to be forced to listen to music," she said.
It's not the first time that Fornof-Lippencott has taken ... alternative approaches to sentencing. In cases of financial irresponsibility, for instance, she offered defendants the chance to cut their fines by watching TV documentaries on fiscal prudence.
Playing classical music for Vactor, she hoped, would "broaden [his] horizons". It seems it mostly gave him a headache.
