'Long Island Lolita' Becomes Long Island Liebling?

By: Erin Olson Amy Fisher's journalism career began with an Internet search. Now she's an award-winning columnist and author of a new book.

Three years ago, Robbie Woliver and Bill Jensen were starting a newspaper called The New Island Ear -- now The Long Island Press, a popular weekly published in Garden City, N.Y. -- and they took their search for famous Long Islanders online. There they found Fisher, best known for her teenaged affair with Joey Buttafuoco, which resulted in her shooting his wife, Mary Jo. Drew Barrymore played Fisher in the TV movie of her life.

How did she rank as a famous Long Islander? "She was always number one," Woliver said of Fisher. "She was above Teddy Roosevelt, she was above Billy Joel, and we realized people are really interested in her."

Woliver and Jensen were interested, too -- interested enough to ask Fisher, the "Long Island Lolita," to write a column. She agreed.

Under the original agreement, Fisher was to write one feature column about her life since leaving prison, where she served nearly seven years for first-degree assault. However, Woliver was so impressed by her work and the public response to her story that he asked her if she would write a regular column.

Fisher, who just turned 30, has maintained a high standard in that weekly column, Woliver said, adding that it has "evolved"--from a general column, to a forum used to respond to questions about her, to its present form, in which she writes about the wrongly accused and true crime, based on her own research.

Not only does she turn in clean copy, Woliver boasted, but Fisher has never missed a deadline. "She goes away on vacation--the story is done," he said. "And they just get better and better."

The Society of Professional Journalists awarded Fisher, who is now married, pregnant, and has a three-year-old son, a Press Club Media Award this year. She won in the Column/News category for a story on the release of Kathy Boudin, the former '60s radical, from prison. According to Woliver, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies posts many of her columns on its Web site. He added that the paper has gotten requests to syndicate Fisher's column, requests he said they are "seriously considering."

In addition to her column, Fisher recently released a book, co-authored by Woliver, about her life, titled "If I Knew Then...," and she taped a segment this week for Oprah Winfrey's talk show.

"She worked hard for this," Woliver said.