"Sisters out for kidney donation want to be pardoned in Miss.; Two had served 16 years for armed robbery" by Holbrook Mohr | Associated Press, January 13, 2012
JACKSON, Miss. - Two sisters released from a Mississippi prison last year on condition that one donate a kidney to the other were saddened and disappointed they are not among dozens receiving full pardons, one of the women said yesterday.
Former governor Haley Barbour granted more than 200 reprieves in his final days in office. Most were full pardons, though some received suspended sentences.
Jamie and Gladys Scott had served nearly 16 years of their life sentences for armed robbery when they were released on Jan. 7, 2011. Barbour granted Jamie Scott early release because she suffers from kidney failure and agreed to let Gladys Scott go on the condition she follow through on her offer to donate a kidney within one year. Barbour said Jamie Scott’s dialysis was costing Mississippi about $200,000 a year.
Gladys Scott said yesterday that she started crying when she found out. She said she is in nursing school, but will not be able to become a nurse unless her record is wiped clean.
“I have to report to the Mississippi Department of Corrections for the rest of my life for a crime I didn’t commit,’’ she said. “I guess if I had been a murderer, he would have pardoned me.’’
That seems to be more common in AmeriKa these days.
The sisters say they are innocent, and their lawyer said others involved in the crime have recanted testimony. One of the alleged victims said last year that the sisters planned the 1993 stickup in which he was lured down a dark road and robbed at gunpoint by three teenage boys. Civil rights advocates said the sisters’ sentences were far too harsh.
Chokwe Lumumba, the sisters’ lawyer, said that he will ask Governor Phil Bryant, a Republican, to pardon the women.
Bryant’s spokesman Mick Bullock said in an e-mail that “Governor Bryant has no intentions to pardon anyone.’’
Barbour’s representative did not respond to messages seeking comment.
“It is very contradictory to me . . . that you got people accused of killing people, burning their bodies, and all that kind of stuff, killing pregnant people, who are walking free without any restrictions, and the Scott sisters don’t have that kind of freedom,’’ Lumumba said yesterday....
Barbour has been criticized by many for granting the reprieves, mostly to people who had already served their sentences. But some were convicted killers serving life terms.
Late Wednesday, Hinds County Circuit Judge Tomie Green temporarily blocked the release of 21 inmates who were given pardons or medical release by Barbour.
Green issued the injunction at the request of Attorney General Jim Hood, a Democrat who said he believes Barbour might have violated the state constitution by pardoning some inmates who failed to give sufficient public notice that they were seeking to have their records cleared.
Gladys Scott said yesterday that she has lost 20 percent of her body weight but needs to lose 50 percent.
Lumumba does not think they would be sent back to prison even if they never have the transplant.
“This governor, amongst other things, is a smart man and he knows, he’s got to know, that it would be an absolute human rights violation to put any legal imposition on someone because of what they have done or what they have not done to their body.’’
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"Barbour defends pardons, clemencies" Associated Press, January 14, 2012
RIDGELAND, Miss. - Haley Barbour, former governor of Mississippi, said yesterday that he is “very comfortable’’ with his decision to grant pardons or other clemency to more than 200 people, including convicted murderers, in his last days in office.
In his first interview about the pardons, Barbour said that nearly 190 of those who received pardons or other reprieves had already been released from prison.
Only 10 have been or will be fully released from prison, he said, adding that it is a tradition in the state for governors to free the trusties who worked at the Governor’s Mansion.
Barbour said state corrections officials pick those people, who are usually men convicted of crimes of passion.
I suppose that makes all the difference(?).
“Let’s get the facts straight,’’ Barbour said. “Of the 215 who received clemency, 189 were not let out of jail. They were already out of jail.’’
Attorney General Jim Hood, the only Democrat remaining in statewide elected office in the state, denounced Barbour’s actions as shameful and possibly unconstitutional....
Yesterday, Barbour said he had not anticipated that the pardons would become centered on politics, although he expected some backlash.
Barbour said his father died when he was 2 years old. And when his grandfather, a judge, became disabled, an inmate was assigned to help him.
“I watched the power of a second chance and what it did for Leon Turner,’’ Barbour said.
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Also see: Mansion work ends for Miss. inmates
