For reality TV stars Joe and Teresa Giudice, a very different kind of reality awaits them. For years, the stars of New Jersey’s most popular reality TV show enjoyed celebrity-status, celebrating lavishness and self-indulgence before a national audience.

Now, in an epoch fall from grace, they face the reality of a cold, dank prison cell.

At the federal courthouse in Newark last Thursday, October 2, 2014, Joe and Teresa Giudice, two of the more tantalizing characters on Bravo’s “Real Housewives of New Jersey,” were sentenced to 41 months and 15 months, respectively. What for? For unlawfully obtaining millions of dollars in loans and for hiding income and assets in a 2009 bankruptcy filing.

Reporters from across the nation descended upon Newark, NJ, packing the courtroom to capacity for the day-long event, marked by apologies and tears from the Giudices and stern admonishments from U.S. District Court Judge Esther Salas, who sentenced both husband and wife.

Mindful of the fact that the couple has four daughters and that imprisonment of both would entail excessive hardship on the children, Judge Salas decided to allow one of the Giudices to remain free to care for the children while the other is incarcerated. Then, upon release of the first, the second will “go away.” Teresa Giudice will serve her 15-month term first. She must turn herself in on January 5, 2015.

Upon Teresa’s release, Joe Giudice will begin his 41-month term. The husband, who was born in Italy and who never obtained U.S. citizenship, faces perhaps an even more dire fate than incarceration itself: the possibility of deportation when his term is complete.

Joe and Teresa each apologized for their crimes, expressing remorse. They had previously pleaded guilty to multiple bankruptcy fraud counts, along with conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud. Joe also pleaded guilty to one count of failure to file a tax return.

“I stand here humiliated before the court and my family and society,” Joe Giudice said before sentencing. “I disgraced many people, including my wife and four daughters. I take full responsibility for my actions. I promise to be a better person.”

A tearful Teresa spoke before her own sentencing hours later. “I’m so scared,” she said. “I’m blessed, but today I am also humbled. I fully take responsibility for my actions. This is not how I was raised. I am more sorry than anyone will ever know.”

Judge Salas considered sparing Teresa from prison. In the end, however, the judge said she needed to send a message that criminal behavior would not be tolerated, regardless of one’s celebrity status.

“For a moment, I thought about probation,” Judge Salas said. “For a moment.”

Judge Salas added: “I need to send a message that it isn’t who you are, how famous you are. If you do something wrong, there will be consequences to pay.”

Judge Salas expressed some sympathy for Teresa, blaming her husband for being the ring-leader in perpetrating this fraud. Salas referred to Teresa as a “dedicated mother” and highlighted her “genuine remorse.”

At the same time, Salas did not mince words when she said how “greatly offended” she was by the lack of transparency in the disclosures that the couple made to probation officials when they were being interviewed for their pre-sentence reports.

Perhaps this was one of the reasons why Salas ultimately decided to impose a custodial sentence on Teresa: “Confinement is absolutely necessary in this case. I don’t honestly believe you respect the law.”

For as harsh a sentence as fifteen months might sound for a first-time offender whose level of participation was minimal at best, under the sentencing guidelines Teresa could have been sentenced to as much as twenty-seven months under the plea agreement.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Romankow, who prosecuted the case, opposed any leniency for Theresa, arguing that she was just as guilty as Joe in the mortgage and bankruptcy fraud.

“He was the captain of the ship. Well, she was the first mate,” Romankow said.

“The house she is living in now is a product of criminal conduct,” Romankow added, referring to the fraudulent loans that helped finance it. “She is not deserving of a variance. She is deserving of a sentence of 21 months.”

Lest you think that Salas was picking on Teresa, she was even more critical of Joe. Citing Joe’s long history of brushes with the law in the years leading up to the fraud – going down the laundry list of assault, possession of marijuana, and impersonating a police officer – Judge Salas wouldn’t even give Joe a pass on his driving record, stating that it “demonstrates his reckless disregard for the law.”

Miles Feinstein, Joe’s attorney, painted a softer portrait of his client. In so doing, he asked Judge Salas to consider leniency because Joe stepped up to the plate and took responsibility for the crimes.

“That is the mark of a real man,” Feinstein said.

Mr. Feinstein discussed the recent loss of Joe’s father, Frank, and the impact that it had on Joe. Sadly, Frank died of a massive heart attack “in Joe’s arms.” Though mostly apathetic throughout the hearing, upon hearing Mr. Feinstein discuss his father’s death and how close he was to his father, his eyes began to well up with tears.

“Nobody can say Joe Giudice is not a good and considerate son,” Feinstein said. “He’s a low-key and loving individual. This is the real Joe. Not the ‘Housewives’ Joe.”

Mr. Feinstein also read a letter from Filomena, Joe’s mother, who could not be in court due to health problems. “My son needs a slap on the wrist, not to be taken away from his family,” she wrote.

Turning Filomena’s words upside down in the wake of a long and uncomfortable silence, Judge Salas told Joe that he would not escape without significant punishment. “It’s not a slap on your wrist you need, Mr. Giudice. Uh-uh,” Salas said. “You need to understand the laws of this country and that they need to be respected.”

If there was one issue that incensed Judge Salas more than any other, it was the couple’s “glaring” omissions and inconsistencies in their required pre-sentencing financial disclosure statement. A close second was the fact that Mr. Feinstein couldn’t confirm whether Joe had actually paid the $224,000 he owes in back taxes. Not mincing any words, Judge Salas called it, “a direct affront to the court.”

She did not relent: “I am not sure you respect our laws. And I am not sure you understand yet what you did.”

In arriving at a sentence that was “fair and in the interest of justice,” Judge Salas did not just consider the aggravating factors. She also considered the mitigating factors, including the dozens of letters written on Joe’s behalf, describing him as a loving and devoted husband and father.

“A sentence under the top end of the range would be appropriate,” she said, “but I have to give you credit for the life you have lived, at least to the people you have loved.”

Before concluding the hearing, Judge Salas told Joe that she wished him luck: “What you did in this case doesn’t define you as a man … You have a lot to live for.”

She said U.S. immigration officials told the court that if they do seek to deport Joe, they would wait until after he has served his sentence.

Henry Klingeman, Teresa ‘s attorney, raised the “almost certain” deportation of Joe in his plea for leniency for Teresa. In so doing, he asked Judge Salas to sentence Teresa to probation or home confinement with community service.

“They will not be holding hands at their daughters’ graduation,” Klingeman said. “They will not be holding hands at their weddings. They will not be holding hands at the hospital when their grandchildren are born. This family is not going to be temporarily separated. They will be permanently separated.”

In a day filled with more drama than an episode of “The Young and The Restless,” the normally sterile courthouse was brimming with entertainment bloggers and others who apparently had never stepped foot in a federal courtroom before.

One had an electronic stylus and tablet to take notes. When the U.S. marshals told him to surrender his device, he protested, asking how he was supposed to write.

“Try a pad and pen,” he was told. He had neither.

Another person took a picture with his camera phone in the hallway – which is prohibited in a federal courthouse. His phone was soon confiscated.

Outside the courthouse following Teresa’s sentencing, U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman said Teresa’s fame didn’t impact the prosecution one way or another.

“The fact she is a celebrity played no role in her punishment,” Fishman said. “But it sends a message that these are the kinds of crimes that send people to jail.”

What precipitated all of this? The couple’s troubles first started in 2009, when they declared bankruptcy, citing millions in debt and blaming the economy for their financial woes.

The bankruptcy trustee representing their creditors questioned the couple’s failure to declare assets and income, including rental properties and Teresa’s “Real Housewives of New Jersey” actual salary. Joe “pleaded the Fifth” when asked about the allegedly flawed bankruptcy filing, and they both abandoned their quest to get their debt discharged. The couple still owes millions to creditors.

Joe was indicted in 2010 for using his brother’s identification to get a New Jersey driver’s license because his own was suspended due to a DUI.

And in July 2013, federal prosecutors not only brought bankruptcy fraud charges against the couple but alleged a long-running conspiracy beginning as far back as their pre-fame days to illegally obtain millions in mortgages, construction loans, and lines of credit using falsified W-2 forms and tax returns. Joe also failed to pay income tax on nearly $1 million in earnings over five years, according to prosecutors.

They maintained their innocence: “We’re good people. I don’t understand why this is happening to us,” Teresa said in an interview with Bravo’s Andy Cohen, claiming prosecutors targeted them because they’re famous. However, the house of cards soon began to fall.

The couple also faces court fines and must make restitution of more than $400,000.

Bravo, the network that airs “Real Housewives,” declined to comment on the sentencing. But in a show of defiance that their prison sentences will not stand between them and the spotlight, the couple recently sat down with Bravo’s Andy Cohen on “Watch What Happens” for a post-sentencing interview.

This is the second high profile tax case to involve a reality TV star from New Jersey in the past two weeks. In September, Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino pleaded not guilty to tax-related crimes.

When I think about all of the NJ reality TV stars to have been charged with tax crimes in recent years, I can’t help but start humming the words to the rhyme, “Here we go round the mulberry bush” that my mom sang to me as I child:

Here we go round the mulberry bush,
The mulberry bush,
The mulberry bush.
Here we go round the mulberry bush
On a cold and frosty morning.

Upon seeing pictures of Joe and Teresa splashed on the front pages of the tabloids, my mind might just as well be saying, “Here we go again!”