Day before prison?

[MarshalFoch]

I was watching the film Goodfellas with several of my roommates and found it odd that Ray Liotta's character gets an entire day off between his sentencing and the beginning of his prison term. A roommate recalled that this is the basis of an entire movie (25th Hour). None of us have any practical experience dealing with anything above a local police jail, and I was curious if this is a common practice since I assume it is a discretionary thing?

[The Spartan]

According to chapter thirteen of Wiseguy (the book the movie was based upon which, in turn, is based on the real life of Henry Hill) it was a result of the appeals his lawyer filed. They managed to delay and delay until the appeals ran out. He also spent those 21 months committing every crime he could to save up money for his wife and kids: ripping off loan sharks, reorganizing his chop shops to raise up funds, arson (it says he was buying Sterno in bulk), running up debt he'd never pay back on a restaurant he owned, etc.