FORT COLLINS, Colo. — The Colorado man who admitted orchestrating the balloon boy hoax reported to jail this morning to begin a 90-day jail sentence.

Richard Heene pleaded guilty to attempting to influence a public servant after the Oct. 15 saga that captivated a national television audience.

But Heene now says he truly believed his 6-year-old son Falcon was inside the balloon and that he pleaded guilty only to appease authorities and save his wife from being deported to Japan.

Mayumi Heene confessed to deputies, authorities said, and she pleaded guilty to filing a false report. She faces a 20-day jail term.

Heene wore a dark knit cap, sunglasses and a heavy jacket as he drove himself to the Larimer County jail in a red minivan.

Heene said last week that his wife misunderstood the meaning of the word "hoax" when she purportedly confessed.

"My wife's first language is Japanese, not English," Heene said. "My wife came home in tears wondering what she might have said. She opened this Japanese-to-English dictionary, and she walks up to me crying her head off, and she says to me, 'I thought hoax meant an exhibition."'