Dina Lohan appeared on NBC's "Today Show" Friday morning to...

Dina Lohan appeared on NBC's "Today Show" Friday morning to discuss her daughter Lindsay's recent stint in jail and rehab. (Aug. 13, 2010) Credit: TodayShow.com screengrab

Saying she thinks that her daughter Lindsay Lohan's rehab time will be cut short because the judge in the case has recused herself, Dina Lohan told Matt Lauer on NBC's "Today" show Friday morning that Lindsay would be returning home to the New York City area afterward.

Lohan also said she believes the actress did not deserve the jail-and-rehab sentence imposed by Judge Marsha Revel for violating probation in a 2007 DUI conviction.

"Not for this particular offense," Lohan, 47, said. "She was in for just missing a couple of [alcohol-education] classes that she made up, and she was working at the time. So the judge went overboard and put her in serious lockdown for two weeks."

In a second interview on the show, Lohan backed down from her earlier claim that Lauer was wrong in saying Lindsay had been to rehab four times, insisting it had been only twice. So Lauer ticked them off - Wonderland, Promises and Cirque Lodge in 2007 and UCLA now, where she's been since Aug. 2 for a scheduled 90-day treatment. Dina Lohan then conceded Lindsay was in court-ordered rehab three times and voluntarily once.

Dina's ex-husband, Michael Lohan, 50, appeared on CBS' "The Early Show" Friday, saying both he and Dina should stay out of their daughter's career.

"I tried to do my best as a father," he said. "I made my mistakes. I wound up in jail. . . . Lindsay certainly paid a price for that. . . . But it's time to put everything aside. I thought Dina did that. But, obviously, you know, we have some work to do ourselves on this."

Dina Lohan bristled when Lauer questioned whether she could have done more as a parent. "When she went out to Los Angeles when she was 19, I had to let her go and live and fall and fail and survive. . . . I was there in proximity but you can't make your child not go out and go to a club and not get behind the wheel of a car," Dina said.

Lindsay, she said, is "still paying the price from 2007," but added, "She has grown up considerably.".With AP

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