Paris Hilton free; neighbors less so

LOS ANGELES – Paris Hilton got out of jail Tuesday and immediately got back to being Paris Hilton, summoning a hair-salon van and, by her mere presence, creating a huge traffic jam that angered the neighbors.

“There’s not going to be a press conference today. I just spoke to Mr. Hilton. They have no plans to make any statement,” police Sgt. B. Anthony Roberts told reporters assembled outside the front gate of her grandparents’ estate as the newly freed heiress kept a low profile inside.

Although Hilton kept out of sight, her presence was still palpable up and down the block, from the TV satellite vans that took up so much room on the narrow street that cars couldn’t pass one another to the fast-food luncheon that was passed along to the assembled masses outside.

Her transition back to celebutante started hours earlier when she was let out of jail shortly after midnight in a seedy section of Lynwood. Hilton managed to transform the event to almost the equivalent of a red-carpet arrival.

With cameras flashing, she made her so-called perp walk from jail to a waiting SUV by smiling, waving and strutting past the assembled masses in tight jeans and white stiletto heels. She ignored shouted questions, but occasionally said hi or slapped hands with sheriff’s deputies holding the photographers at bay until she reached the SUV and hugged her mother.

From there it was a quick drive to fashionable Holmby Hills, home to Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner among others, and a stop at her grandparents’ house.

As she stayed inside throughout the day, more than a dozen cars pulled up to the gate and were quickly buzzed inside, their occupants declining to talk with reporters.

Hilton was scheduled to break her silence tonight with an interview on CNN’s “Larry King Live.”