Lindsay Lohan risks jail return

Actress Lindsay Lohan arrives for a private dinner celebrating the upcoming premiere of "Liz & Dick" at the Beverly Hills Hotel in Beverly Hills, California November 20, 2012. [Photo/Agencies]

Lindsay Lohan on Thursday faced the possibility of being sent back to jail after a tumultuous 24 hours in which she was arrested in New York for assault, and charged in California with reckless driving and lying to police over a June car crash.

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Lohan, 26, who has been to rehab, jail and court multiple times since a 2007 arrest for drunk driving and cocaine possession, is still on unsupervised probation in Los Angeles for a 2011 jewelry theft.

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But prosecutors in Santa Monica, California, said in a statement on Thursday that the "Mean Girls" actress lied to police when she told them she was not at the wheel of her Porsche when it smashed into a truck on a busy highway in the summer.

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They charged Lohan with three misdemeanor counts stemming from that collision, hours after the troubled starlet was arrested on suspicion of punching a woman in the face at a Manhattan nightclub.

Frank Mateljan of the Los Angeles City Attorney's office, which handled the jewelry case, said prosecutors were still awaiting paperwork from New York and Santa Monica to determine if they will pursue a probation violation case against Lohan.

A Los Angeles judge told Lohan in March that she must obey all rules until 2014, and advised her to stop night clubbing and focus on her work.