By Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo News Editor
EAST VILLAGE — A local artist who missed his own gallery show after getting busted for writing graffiti last month pleaded guilty Wednesday to a misdemeanor criminal mischief charge.
Angel "LA II" Ortiz, who was arrested for vandalism on the eve of his gallery opening in the East Village last month and then was nabbed again a couple weeks later for the same offense, was sentenced to 45 days in jail including time served on Wednesday at Manhattan Criminal Court.
Ortiz, 44, has already spent a month on Rikers Island for writing graffiti, forcing him to miss the bulk of his ultimately unsuccessful exhibition at the Dorian Grey Gallery on East 9th Street.
The Manhattan District Attorney's pushed for a six-month sentence, but the judge settled on 45 days after Ortiz agreed to plead guilty to the top charge.
"I'm heartbroken for him because I know he's hurting," said Ramona Lugo, a friend who has been letting Ortiz work out of her East Village framing shop and attended his court appearance Wednesday.
"He's going though hell in there. He doesn't belong in there. He's a good person."
Ortiz earned accolades as a teenager in the '80s for his creative collaboration with Keith Haring, helping influence the celebrated pop artist's style and traveling the world to show the pair's work.
He got picked up for spray-painting his tag, "LA ROC," on a Second Avenue building on March 11, and then again on March 28 for the same offense on East 11th Street.
"I do what I do," Ortiz told DNAinfo after his first arrest. "The streets are my canvases."
His attorney was unavailable for comment following sentencing.
