Kidney donation gets 2 sisters out of prison
Gladys Scott must donate kidney to her sibling within a year
Last Updated: Friday, January 7, 2011 | 9:35 AM ET Comments8Recommend3.
The Associated Press
Supporters of sisters Gladys and Jamie Scott in Jackson, Miss., on Sept. 10 call for their release while the two were serving life sentences for robbery. (Rogelio V. Solis/Associated Press)
Two sisters serving life sentences for robbery in Mississippi have been released on the condition that one donates a kidney to the other.
Jamie and Gladys Scott waved to reporters as they left the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in Pearl early Friday.
They had been incarcerated for 16 years over an armed robbery that netted between $11 and $200 US. They would have been eligibile for parole in 2014.
They are moving to the Florida Panhandle, where their mother and grown children live.
Jamie Scott, 36, is on dialysis, which officials said costs the state about $200,000 a year.
Gov. Haley Barbour agreed to release her because of her medical condition. But 38-year-old Gladys Scott's release order says she must donate the kidney within one year.
The idea to donate the kidney was Gladys Scott's, and she volunteered to do it in her petition for early release.
The sisters' lawyer, Chokwe Lumumba, said the women hope to get government-funded Medicaid health insurance in Florida, and begin the needed steps to make the transplant happen.
© The Canadian Press, 2011
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