Free the Scott Sisters: Grace calling Mississippi.

Hey Friends of Justice out there:

Don't let Governor Barbour leave Jamie and Gladys to die in prison.

This week is a pretty critical time for folks to be contacting the Governor of Mississippi to implore him to pardon Jamie and Gladys Scott. I'm posting one of the more recent news editorials detailing their struggle below. You can also hit their mom's blogspot for more info (Evelyn Rasco - such a beautiful soul - is their mom; Nancy Lockhart and Sis Marpessa are their champions). Be prepared for some awesome gospel, blues, and soul to stream through when you open it (that means crank up your speakers, not turn them down)!


The conditions of the prison they're in - particularly the trailer where Jamie receives dialysis treatments (when the machine is working, that is) are horrendous - but you needn't make reference to that in your communication with Governor Barbour's office about the pardon - there's an appropriate contact for that below.


If you're a registered Republican - even from outside of Mississippi - please share that with Governor Barbour in your letter, as the man will likely be running for national office in 2012. It would help for him to know that real Republicans are interested in seeing that Americans are capable of delivering both justice and mercy when we've been wrong...


Here's the info to reach Governor Haley Barbour (visit that link, first, to get to know a little about him):

Honorable Haley Barbour
P.O. Box 139
Jackson, Mississippi 39205


1-877-405-0733
governor@governor.state.ms.us


You may also want to put something on letterhead and e-mail it as an attachment to the governor's personal assistant - Dorothy Kuykendal:

DKuykendall@governor.state.ms.us

Jamie Scott (center) with Mom and brother.

Also, check out this recent post and please contact the Mississippi health department regarding the black mold, toilets in Quick Bed and inadequate infrastructure in this dialysis trailer which are all located at Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in Pearl, Mississippi. There are a lot of lives at stake - the survival rates for sick Mississippi prisoners have plummeted in recent years under the current health care provider, Wexford - Mother Jones did an excellent piece on this in March.


Jeffrey K. Brown, Ph.D., R.P.E., B.C.E.
Bureau Director
State Public Health Entomologist
Mississippi State Department of Health
570 East Woodrow Wilson Avenue
Jackson, Mississippi 39216


601.576.7972 Office
601.576.7632 Fax
769.257.2242 Cell


jeffrey.brown@msdh.state.ms.us
www.healthyms.com



Here's the latest article giving some background on Jamie and Gladys. Please take action on their behalf THIS WEEK.

----------From the Seattle Times via Free The Scott Sisters----------

Sisters may or may not be guilty, but Mississippi assuredly is


Leonard Pitts Jr.


Sunday, November 21, 2010

Let's assume they did it.

Let's assume that two days before Christmas in 1993, a 22-year-old black woman named Jamie Scott and her pregnant 19-year-old sister Gladys set up an armed robbery. Let's assume these single mothers lured two men to a spot outside the tiny town of Forest, Miss., where three teenage boys, using a shotgun the sisters supplied, relieved the men of $11 and sent them on their way, unharmed.

Assume all of the above is true, and still you must be shocked at the crude brutality of the Scott sisters' fate. You see, the sisters, neither of whom had a criminal record before this, are still locked away in state prison, having served 16 years of their double-life sentences.

It bears repeating. Each sister is doing double life for a robbery in which $11 was taken and nobody was hurt. Somewhere, the late Nina Simone is moaning her signature song:

"Mississippi Goddam."

For the record, two of the young men who committed the robbery testified against the sisters as a condition of their plea bargain. All three reportedly received two-year sentences and were long ago released. No shotgun or forensic evidence was produced at trial. The sisters have always maintained their innocence.

Observers are at a loss to explain their grotesquely disproportionate sentence. Early this year, the Jackson Advocate, a weekly newspaper serving the black community in the state capital, interviewed the sisters' mother, Evelyn Rasco. She described the sentences as payback for her family's testimony against a corrupt sheriff. According to her, that sheriff's successor vowed revenge.

You don't have to believe that to believe this: Mississippi stands guilty of a grievous offense against simple decency.

But there is hope. Recently, the sisters' cause has been championed by high-powered allies. New York Times columnist Bob Herbert and the NAACP have called on Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour to pardon the two women. I add my voice to theirs.

I have no way of knowing if the Scott sisters' fate is tied in to some sheriff's revenge and at some level, the question is moot. Whatever the proximate cause of this ridiculous sentence, the larger cause is neon clear: the Scott sisters are black women in the poorest state in the union. And as report after report has testified, if you are poor or black (and God help you if you are both), the American justice system has long had this terrible tendency to throw you away like garbage. Historically, this has been especially true in the South.

If you doubt it, play with the scenario in your head. Try to imagine some rich white girl doing double life for an $11 robbery. You can't.

But then, that girl has access to a brand of justice unavailable to women like Jamie and Gladys Scott. She will receive every break the law allows her and maybe a few it does not. No one will throw her away.

And while it would be nice to think this problem of discarding people's lives would be solved by the release of the Scott sisters, the truth is, that wouldn't even address it.

How many other Scott sisters and brothers are languishing behind bars for no good reason, doing undeserved hard time on nonexistent evidence, perjured testimony, prosecutorial misconduct or sheer racial or class bias?

So fixing the problem the Scott sisters represent involves nothing less than the reformation of the justice system, a commitment to make it, as the name implies, a system that reliably produces "justice” as opposed to these too frequent miscarriages thereof.

Meantime, Jamie Scott, who is in her late 30s now, is in poor health. She is said to be losing her vision and both her kidneys have failed. And we wait for common sense to take hold in Mississippi.

It is a situation that shocks the senses, even if we assume they did it.

Now, assume they did not.

Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts Jr.'s column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is: lpitts@miamiherald.com

From: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/2013477385_pitts21.html

Where there is Darkness, Light...

This is stunning (Congratulations David Cantor). In a time and place where we've come to expect the worst from our public servants, Mr. Romley seems to be emerging as a man who is willing to put his job - serving the people - before his career. Unfortunately, that's something of a miracle here.

I can think of a few people who could learn something from this, beginning with the governor herself. As some of you may know, she's left a man she knows to be innocent, William Macumber, to die in a prison cell.

I can also think of a few more innocent souls whose nightmares have yet to end. Courtney Bisbee is one. Andrew Thomas buried the evidence that will exonerate her. God willing, Mr. Romley will have the political courage to set someone free again. It's one thing to correct an injustice done on the watch of another, however. It's something else altogether to admit and fix the ones we own.

Mr. Romley has a long history here; I hope he's willing to take responsibility for that as well. If so, even people like me might vote for him then. If not, we may just give up believing there's enough difference between any of them to bother voting any more at all. For now, however, we're grateful for this ray of light in the darkness that envelops the wrongly convicted, and for the hope that it brings to their loved ones.

Blessings to you, Lisa Randall: welcome to the rest of your life. May you be forever free.

------------------------------

Charges Dropped, Nightmare Ends for Peoria Woman

KSAZ Fox News

Updated: Thursday, 22 Jul 2010, 7:22 PM MDT
Published : Thursday, 22 Jul 2010, 7:22 PM MDT

PHOENIX - A beloved babysitter for nearly three decades found herself charged with murder in the death of a baby under her care. But now, a prosecutor has dismissed those charges.

"I can finally breathe. It's been a long 3 and a half years of hell," said Randall as she came out of a courthouse Thursday. Her ankle monitoring bracelet will finally come off.

In 2007, Lisa Randall's odyssey began as she faced the death penalty when 4-month-old Dillon died while in Randall's Peoria home in day care.

A medical examiner has since ruled the 4-month-old boy's death as undetermined, but Randall's attorney, David Cantor, says the child died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. (S.I.D.S.)

"Lisa was the victim of a witch hunt," said Cantor. "She had a police department with a detective who did his first homicide investigation, and his last, he didn't know what he was doing. And the medical examiners based everything on the information given to them from the detective, which was faulty."

The detective had said the baby suffered blunt force trauma, but when there was an autopsy, no skull fractures were found.

"Rick Romley, once he took over and Andrew Thomas was out, we finally had a voice of reason. They put it to an incidents review committee and they voted 8-0 and said this case needs to be dismissed in the interest of justice."

All charges were dropped and a court tossed out the case. Randall may decide to file a civil lawsuit against the Peoria Police Department and the Maricopa County Attorney's Office.

This is the first prosecutor-initiated dismissal of a capital murder case in at least 10 years in Maricopa County.

Wexford , Mississippi & Jamie Scott: Cruel and Unusual Health Care.

from the day of Blogging (March 25) for Jamie Scott at Mother Jones.
Thank you both for being in on this one:
------------

Cruel and Unusual Health Care

How Mississippi prisoner Jamie Scott's life sentence could turn into a death sentence.

By James Ridgeway and Jean Casella | Thu Mar. 25, 2010 3:00 AM PDT

---

On February 25, a small crowd gathered outside the state capitol in Jackson, Mississippi, to push for the release of sisters Jamie and Gladys Scott, who are serving two consecutive life sentences apiece for a 1993 armed robbery [1] in which no one was injured and the take was about $11. Supporters of the Scott sisters have long tried to draw attention to their case as an extreme example of the distorted justice and draconian sentencing laws that have overloaded prisons [2], crippled state budgets, and torn families apart across the United States. But in recent months, their cause has taken on a new urgency, because Jamie Scott's unwarranted life sentence may soon become a death sentence.

Jamie, 38, is suffering from kidney failure. In order to stave off further complications, she needs either a kidney transplant or regular sessions of dialysis, a procedure in which blood is drained from the patient through a cleansing filter and then returned to the body. But at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility (CMCF) in Pearl, where Jamie and Gladys are incarcerated, medical services are provided by a private contractor called Wexford, which has been the target of lawsuits and legislative investigations in several states over inadequate treatment of the inmates in its care. According to Jamie's family, in the eight weeks since her condition became life-threatening, she has endured faulty or missed dialysis sessions, infections, and other complications. She has received no indication that prison doctors are considering a kidney transplant as an option, though her sister is a willing donor.

Jamie's family and legal advisors believe the poor health care she is receiving in prison places her life at risk. The Mississippi Department of Corrections (MDOC) has a provision for what it calls "conditional medical release"—but Jamie is not a candidate, department spokesperson Suzanne Garbo Singletary said in an email, because "MDOC policy provides that an inmate must have a condition that is 'incapacitating, totally disabling and/or terminal in nature' in order to qualify." So Jamie appears to be caught in a deadly catch-22. In order to be released from prison, she must convince the MDOC that her illness is terminal or "totally disabling"—and it seems the authorities won't be persuaded of that unless she dies in prison.

Since Jamie became critically ill, her supporters have also appealed to Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour to consider early compassionate release. They have received no response—and the prospects don't look good: Barbour has a record of being extremely stingy when it comes to issuing pardons. He is also currently engaged in a budget battle with his state legislature to prevent cuts to Mississippi's prison spending, and the early releases [3] such cuts would demand. According to a local television station that reported [4] on the rally at the capitol, a spokesperson for Barbour said that "Jamie Scott was tried, convicted and incarcerated, and she is receiving her care with the Department of Corrections."

A Sick System

In telephone interviews, the Scott sisters' mother, Evelyn Rasco, described the treatment Jamie has received at Central Mississippi Correctional Facility (CMCF), based on her own observations and information provided by her two daughters. Jamie, who has diabetes and bouts of high blood pressure, said that prison medical staff told her in 1997 that she had high protein levels in her urine, indicating possible kidney problems.

Until recently, however, she received minimal treatment beyond the insulin prescribed for her diabetes. Jamie's physical and mental health suffered last fall when she spent 23 days in solitary confinement (for being found in an "unauthorized area" in the prison gym) and was cut off from her routine of work, classes, church, and occasional visits with her sister. Then, in mid-January, Jamie became seriously ill when both her kidneys began shutting down. She was sent to the prison infirmary and, after a week's delay, was taken to hospital. There, doctors inserted a shunt in Jamie's neck to allow her to receive dialysis through a catheter, and she was promptly returned to prison.

Rather than letting Jamie leave the prison regularly for treatment, prison authorities chose to truck in dialysis machines. About three times a week, Jamie has received hemodialysis in a trailer on the prison grounds—if the machines are working properly, which she reports isn't always the case. At one session, Jamie told her mother, the blood was flowing out of her through a catheter into the dialysis machine—but it wasn't flowing back in, so the treatment had to be stopped. At the end of January, another inmate looked in on Jamie, who was locked up alone in her cell, and found her unconscious. She was rushed to the hospital, where doctors told her there were problems with the shunt inserted into her neck. They made adjustments, and she was again returned to prison.

Rasco lives in Pensacola, Florida, where she cares for her daughters' five children while they are behind bars. Since Jamie and Gladys went to prison, Rasco's husband of 30 years died of a heart attack; another daughter died of congestive heart failure; and her oldest son was away for several years serving with the Army in Iraq. In a letter to supporters last year, Jamie wrote [5]: "When I think of the word 'strongest,' I think of my mother. She is 4 feet 9 inches tall and has the strength of Job in the Bible."

Rasco lacks the time and financial resources to visit her daughters often, but in mid-February, she managed to make the trip to Mississippi. When she visited the prison, along with Jamie's 18-year-old son, Jamie was feeling sick but was able to make it to the visiting room. When Rasco returned two days later, she found Jamie in a cell attached to the infirmary. "She was real weak," Rasco said. "She couldn't walk." An infection appeared to have developed at the site of Jamie's catheter, which had filled with blood and pus. Nurses reportedly told Rasco that Jamie should be in the hospital, but the paperwork hadn't been done.

Rasco said that when she entered her daughter's cell, Jamie was sitting on the edge of a hospital bed with dirty linens, near a toilet and wash bowl that had not been cleaned. Prison staff arrived with a plate of food—a hamburger swimming in grease, rice, squash, a piece of cornbread, and a cookie—but Jamie said it looked so bad she couldn't eat it. The doctors at the hospital had given her a list of foods she should eat, including meat, fish, and vegetables, but they were not available, and she did not have permission to purchase food at the prison commissary. (That permission has since been granted.) So Jamie sat on her grimy bed eating a Snickers bar. "She sat right there with me," Rasco said, "and tried to give me a piece." Knowing it was the only nourishment her daughter was likely to have, her mother declined.

Since Rasco's visit, Jamie was back in the hospital for a day after experiencing chest pains following dialysis. Last week, she collapsed and was rushed to hospital, where doctors told the family an infection from an improperly placed shunt had spread through her body. At that point, according to the family, a hospital doctor stepped in and barred the prison from taking Jamie back into her cell, noting that she could die if denied hospital care. As of Wednesday, Jamie is back in prison. Her mother visited her there recently, and according to a person familiar with the case, reported Jamie was very weak and could scarcely walk due to an emergency catheter placed in her groin. She is scheduled to return to the hospital in the next few days, where doctors will prepare her for an operation next week that will attach a permanent fistula or shunt into her body to make kidney dialysis possible. Requests by Mother Jones last week to interview Christopher Epps, the state commissioner of corrections, were denied.

The best medical option for Jamie would be a kidney transplant. Studies show that patients in their thirties who receive successful transplants live considerably longer [6] than those who remain on dialysis. Rasco said that when Gladys Scott, 34, learned of her sister's kidney failure, she immediately offered to give Jamie a kidney. Gladys says that CMCF staff told her that state prisoners don't qualify as donors, and that a transplant would be too expensive, though there is no indication that their statements reflect official MDOC policy. Rasco said that she was hoping the prison would at least let Gladys care for Jamie—feed her and bathe her—as inmates are sometimes allowed to do for ailing relatives. When Rasco last spoke to her, Gladys had not received the necessary permission.

Chokwe Lumumba, a longtime activist and attorney who also serves on the Jackson City Council, is representing the family in the medical matter. In an interview, Lumumba said, "Our first idea is to get some medical attention into the jail. Asking for a private doctor to go in there and see her." But what Jamie really needs, he told me, is "to be in hospital until a kidney transplant."

Singletary, the MDOC's spokesperson, replied to several email inquiries regarding Jamie's care. In one email, she wrote that "MDOC cannot comment on any specific medical condition or treatment for an inmate." In another, she referred to patient privacy laws when asked whether a kidney transplant was being considered for Jamie Scott. Regarding transplants for state prisoners in general, Singletary said that "the state would pay for a needed and necessary transplant" and would do so "when evaluated the Dr. as needed [sic]." Singletary added in another message: "Dialysis units are fully operational with no malfunctions documented in the past several years." She restated the MDOC's policy that "chronic, but stable, medical conditions are not eligible for conditional medical release consideration."

Jamie's care is in the hands of Wexford Health Sources, a Pittsburgh-based private company that provides prison medical services. Wexford's record [7] includes lawsuits by prisoners and current or former employees in at least six states, as well as allegations involving racial discrimination and improper gifts to public officials. In 2006, the Santa Fe Reporter investigated [8] Wexford, which supplied health care to some 6,000 New Mexico prisoners, and discovered widespread complaints, among them that Wexford "refuses to grant off-site visits for seriously ill inmates." The story concluded that "the company's insistence on the bottom line over the care of its charges causes inmates to suffer, sometimes with lasting, even fatal, results. The investigation prompted [9] hearings [10] on prison health care in the New Mexico state legislature, and in December 2006, Governor Bill Richardson ordered [11] the New Mexico Corrections Department to find a new health care provider.

Wexford's reported resistance to allowing inmates access to offsite treatment is particularly relevant to Jamie's case and the potentially dangerous delays she has experienced before being sent to the hospital. The same issue surfaced in a 2002 case in Pennsylvania, where a 26-year-old prisoner named Erin Finley suffered a fatal asthma attack in prison while under Wexford's care. According to the Wilkes Barre Times Herald, Finley's family eventually received a $2.15 million settlement after their lawyer presented evidence showing that "Finley desperately sought medical care for severe asthma she had had since she was a child, but she was repeatedly rejected based on a prison doctor's belief that she was 'faking' her symptoms." On the day of her death, Finley was taken to the prison infirmary several hours after complaining that she was having trouble breathing. A physician's assistant examined her and told the doctor she needed to go to a hospital, "but he refused to see her and left the prison at 2:40 p.m. Twenty minutes later, Finley lost consciousness and stopped breathing," according to the Times Herald. She was finally sent to the hospital—only to be pronounced dead [12].

In Mississippi, where Wexford took over health care for the majority of the state's prisoners in 2006 under a three-year, $95 million contract, the Jackson Clarion Ledger reported [13] in November 2008 that "a search of the federal court system found more than a dozen open lawsuits [7] filed by inmates against MDOC on medical issues." At Central Mississippi Correctional Facility—the prison where the Scott sisters are housed—the sister of a dead inmate said she watched her brother waste away for months from inadequately treated Crohn's Disease, an inflammation of the digestive tract. "He literally starved," Charlotte Boyd said of her brother William Byrd, who died in November 2008. "We watched him turn into a skeleton." Boyd told the Clarion Ledger that people might lack sympathy for prisoners like her brother, a convicted rapist, but "even a dog needs medical attention." She said [7] she believes that "if they are doing him that way, they are going to let somebody else die, too."

In fact, Mississippi has one of the highest prisoner death rates in the nation, according to a review of prison statistics carried out by the Jackson Clarion Ledger's Chris Joyner. The death rate in 2007 was 34 percent higher than in 2006—the year Wexford took over the MDOC's medical care. A December 2007 report conducted by the Mississippi Legislature's Joint Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review (PEER) concluded that inmates were not receiving timely and adequate medical treatment from Wexford. Among other things, the report found that Wexford "did not meet medical care standards set forth under its contract with the state" and "did not adhere to its own standards in following up on inmates with chronic health problems." When questioned about the report and the high prisoner death rates, the Clarion Ledger reported [14], corrections commissioner Epps "said he is satisfied with the contractor's performance." The budget [15] presented by Epps for the coming fiscal year, which begins on July 1, shows a request of $37.4 million to Wexford for medical services.

In response to questions about care provided by Wexford, MDOC spokesperson Singletary wrote: "Jamie Scott is receiving quality medical care for her condition. Wexford provides basic medical care for all inmates at MDOC prisons. Inmates are sent to hospitals if the need for hospital care arises." Singletary stated that such decisions are made by the attending doctor at the prison, a Wexford employee. Wexford did not respond to requests for comment.

Unpardonable Offenses
On December 23, 1993, Jamie and Gladys Scott, then 22 and 19, were both young mothers with no criminal records. They were at the local mini-mart buying heating fuel when they ran into two young men they knew, who offered to give them a ride. Sometime later that evening, the two young men were robbed [16] by a group of three boys, ages 14 to 18, who arrived in another car, armed with a shotgun.
Jamie and Gladys say that they had already left the scene to walk home when the robbery took place. The state insisted they were an integral part of the crime, and in fact had set up the victims to be robbed. Wherever the truth lies, trial transcripts [16] clearly reveal a case based entirely on the testimony of the victims and two of the teenaged co-defendants—who had turned state's evidence against the Scott sisters in return for eight-year sentences—and a prosecutor who appears determined to demonize [16] the two young women.
Jamie and Gladys were not initially arrested for the crime. But ten months later, the 14-year-old co-defendant—who had been in jail on remand during that time—signed a statement implicating them. When questioned by the Scotts' attorney, the boy confirmed that he had been "told that before you would be allowed to plead guilty" to a lesser charge, "you would have to testify against Jamie Scott and Gladys Scott." The boy also testified that he had neither written nor read the statement before signing it. It had been written for him by someone at the county sheriff's office, he said, and he "didn't know what it was." But he had been told that if he signed it "they would let me out of jail the next morning, and that if I didn't participate with them, that they would send me to Parchman [state penitentiary] and make me out a female"—which he took to mean he would be raped. The 18-year-old co-defendant who testified against the Scott sisters also said he was testifying against the Scotts as a condition of his guilty plea to a lesser charge.
But the prosecutor succeeded in depicting Jamie and Gladys not only as participants in the crime robbery, but as its masterminds—two older women who had lured three impressionable boys into the robbing the victims at gunpoint. (This despite the fact that the oldest of the co-defendants was just a year younger than Gladys.) In his summation, he told the jury:

They thought it up. They came up with the plan. They duped three young teenage boys into going along and doing something stupid that is going to cost them the next eight years of their lives in the penitentiary.
That probably makes me, at least, as mad about this case, simply at least as much, as the fact that two people got robbed. That three young boys were duped into doing the dirty work.

The prosecutor also reminded jurors that while Jamie and Gladys admittedly did not have a weapon, the judge's instructions "tell you that if they encourage someone else or counsel them or aid them in any way in committing this robbery they are equally guilty."
It took the jury just 36 minutes to convict the Scott sisters. And while there was a range of possible sentences for the crime of armed robbery, the state asked for—and received—two consecutive life sentences for each sister. In contrast, Edgar Ray Killen, the man convicted in 2005 of manslaughter in the 1964 deaths of civil rights workers Schwerner, Cheney, and Goodman, received a sentence of 60 years [17]—meted out by the same judge who presided over the trial of Jamie and Gladys.
A direct appeal, carried out by the same lawyers who defended them at trial, failed to overturn [18] the Scotts' conviction, because they were tried for a crime committed before October 1994, when even harsher sentencing rules had been introduced.
During her recent visit to Mississippi, Rasco had the opportunity to confront Epps, the state's corrections commissioner, when she attended a meeting at the state capitol on prison budget cuts. She spotted Epps, whom she recognized from a photograph, walked up to him, and told him about her daughter's poor health and the problems with her medical treatment. According to Rasco, Epps said that he was getting a lot of messages about Jamie, and that he would do what he could obtain a pardon or clemency for the Scott sisters. He told her that he was "giving his word on this," although he had no power to actually make it happen himself.
The person who could make it happen is Governor Haley Barbour, whose past record on pardons does not bode well for Jamie and Gladys. Barbour, who took office in 2004, was initially known for refusing to grant any pardons. In his second term he changed course [19]—but only for a particular set of offenders. A 2008 investigation by the Jackson Free Press found that Barbour had pardoned [20]or suspended the sentences of five murderers, four of whom had killed [21] their former or current wives or girlfriends. All five men were part of a prison program under which they did odd jobs at the governor's mansion. Writing in Slate, Radley Balko, summarized [19] Haley Barbour's pardon policy as "show[ing] mercy only to murderers who work on his house."
Jamie's health crisis has also coincided with a protracted struggle between the governor and state legislators over how to handle budget shortfalls. Throughout, the ambitious Barbour, who is talked about [22] as a possible 2012 presidential candidate [23], has appeared determined to polish his reputation for being both fiscally conservative and tough on crime. With revenue down due to the recession, Barbour implemented a series of deep, across-the-board cuts to state spending in the current fiscal year. He recently vetoed a bill that would have restored some of that funding, primarily to education. At the same time, he asked [24] the legislature to put $16 million back into the Department of Corrections budget. "We have the resources to restore funding to our priorities this year," the governor said in a statement [25], "including law enforcement and corrections."
Against opponents who argued that Mississippi already spends more on prisoners than it does on schoolchildren, Barbour held up the specter of what could happen if prison spending was cut: 3,000 to 4,000 inmates would have to be released early. "The threat of convicted criminals on the streets," the Jackson Free Press wrote [3] in February, "has provided Barbour a rhetorical trump card in budget negotiations." Even in light of such rhetoric, it would be difficult to see the Scott sisters as dangerous or violent offenders, although the state of Mississippi has certainly gone to great lengths to depict them as such.
Nancy Lockhart, a legal investigator and analyst based in South Carolina, has been working with Rasco for several years, organizing a grassroots campaign to secure decent treatment for the Scotts and either a review of their case or some provision for their early release. In interviews last week, Lockhart said that she had helped Rasco appeal to the Justice Department, which informed her that the statute of limitations was up for civil rights claims. They plan to try again, offering proof of earlier letters to the DOJ. They have also organized letter writing and email campaigns to numerous state and MDOC officials, and set up a website. The sisters' group of supporters is growing, but they have received few responses to their pleas.
The Scott sisters will be eligible for parole [26] in 2014, after they have served 20 years—though there is no guarantee they will receive it. In the meantime, Evelyn Rasco is praying for mercy, for a good lawyer—and for her daughter Jamie to live that long.
Updates about the Scott sisters' case can be found on Solitary Watch [27], where an earlier version of this story appeared.

---

Source URL: http://motherjones.com/politics/2010/03/jamie-scott-gladys-scott-haley-barbour-wexford-health

Links:
[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anthony-papa/the-scott-sisters-two-lif_b_169468.html
[2] http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/or_20091114_7374.php
[3] http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/index.php/site/comments/behind_barbours_prison_rhetoric_021710/
[4] http://www.my601.com/news/local/story/Evers-Rallies-At-The-Capitol-For-Sick-Inmate/YW1Oe-usD0mpy5qf6yfmxw.cspx
[5] http://freethescottsisters.blogspot.com/2009/08/letter-from-jamie-scott.html
[6] http://blog.nj.com/ledgerarchives/2009/06/kidney_transplant_vs_dialysis.html
[7] http://www.privateci.org/rap_wexford.html
[8] http://sfreporter.com/stories/hard_cell/594/
[9] http://sfreporter.com/stories/top_10_stories_of_2006_prison_break/1047/
[10] http://sfreporter.com/stories/checkup/700/
[11] http://sfreporter.com/stories/sfr_exclusive_wexford_under_fire/1023/
[12] http://www.privateci.org/pennsylvania.htm
[13] http://pittsburgh.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/stories/2006/07/03/story6.html
[14] http://www.prisontalk.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4211453
[15] http://www.mdoc.state.ms.us/FY 2011 Budget Presentation.pdf
[16] http://www.scribd.com/doc/21748820/Scott-transcript
[17] http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/a-13-Preacher-Gets-60-Years-in-Prison-for-1964-Civil-Rights-Slayings-66927232.html
[18] http://www.scribd.com/doc/21748684/Scott-Sisters-Opinion
[19] http://www.slate.com/id/2238938/
[20] http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/index.php/site/comments/barbour_helps_domestic_killers_073008/
[21] http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/index.php/site/comments/barbour_gives_relief_to_4_domestic_killers_of_5_total_080408/
[22] http://www.newsweek.com/id/228841
[23] http://motherjones.com/mojo/2009/06/oh-please-let-haley-barbour-run-president
[24] http://desototimes.com/articles/2010/02/27/news/state/doc4b85d6a19ff94674722118.txt
[25] http://www.wlox.com/Global/story.asp?S=12047247
[26] http://www.mpb.state.ms.us/Parole Board Parole.htm
[27] http://solitarywatch.wordpress.com/

BLACK WOMEN's Defense League: Press Conference Today.

TODAY: NOON

PRESS CONFERENCE: Official "Kick Off" for

"The DIRECT ACTION National Campaign To
FREE THE SCOTT SISTERS NOW !!!!"

FRIDAY MARCH 26, 2010 12 noon

IN FRONT OF THE CAPITOL BUILDING
400 High St. JACKSON, MS

For more information e-mail: nationalmwm@aol.com
Call The Black Women's Defense League @267-636-3802

Official and National Million Woman March & Universal Movements
Black Women's Defense League Unit
P.O. Box 53668
Philadelphia, PA 19105

Scott Watch: They'd better stop messing with Mrs. Rasco's kids...

Celebrate the International Observation of the Anniversary of
the Abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade:

ABOLISH THE PRISON INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX!!
-----------------

This is pretty extraordinary, what's going on at MDOC. Kind of makes me feel grateful for Arizona.

Keeping both Jamie and her family ignorant of her condition seems to be medical malpractice, with malicious intent (the intent of compromising a patient's welfare to protect the welfare of an institution's image - that being the image Wexford and the MDOC want to project...). I just don't buy their assessments: why else do all these outside doctors disagree with them?

The Kidney Foundation could make such a difference in the quality of care Jamie's getting and the access her family has to her and her medical staff, with just a little diplomacy.

------------------

Subject: Jamie Scott Rushed Back To Prison So Mother Could Not Visit Hospital

3/25 SCOTT SISTERS UPDATE!

NOTE: If reading this before 10:00 a.m. EST or 9am CST on 3/25, please tune into http://www.facebook.com/l/c3cc4;www.wjzd.com for a Scott Sisters update from Mrs. Rasco on the Rip Daniels "It's a New Day" (http://www.facebook.com/l/ c3cc4;www.itisanewday.com) show. Rip Daniels is a very dedicated supporter who starts each show off at 10 a.m. daily counting down how long Jamie and Gladys have been wrongfully locked down and tormented in that prison and will even discuss the case during some mornings on his program, so please check in as regularly as you can.

Mrs. Rasco and her entire family are in Mississippi to visit Jamie and Gladys as well as to participate in the 3/26 MWM/BWDL Press Conference scheduled for 12 noon in front of the Jackson, MS Capitol Bldg. at 400 High St. The organization is asking for letters
of support for their campaign by 12 midnight 3/25 to be sent tonationalmwm@aol.com or officialmwm@yahoo.com For more info call: 267-636-3802.

Jamie has been in the hospital since 3/15 with a very serious infection, severe weakness, extreme pain and swelling. Jamie stated that she was "kicked out" of the hospital on Tuesday to prevent Mrs. Rasco from coming in and asking questions, in fact an extra guard was placed there to make certain that Mrs. Rasco didn't come in there to see her. Jamie told Mrs. Rasco that she couldn't believe how her 4' tall momma caused so much worry among those prison officials!

She was abruptly moved to her old cell in the prison to await the visit with her mother and family to take place Wednesday for an hour, after which her family was to visit with Gladys for an hour. However, the Assistant Warden met them at the entrance and stated that some of the children weren't on the list to come in. After much wrangling and his personally searching the young men he permitted everyone to visit both women together BUT for one hour total, which actually ended up being less than an hour due to all of the wasted time spent being searched and with the Asst Warden on the phone rechecking names in the waiting area. The family watched in tears as Jamie climbed off of a bus and limped slowly and weakly to the visiting area and questioned staff as to why she wasn't given a wheelchair,to which they had no answer.

Jamie and Gladys grabbed onto each other and their family members for a very emotional reunion, especially for the children. Both women had lost quite a bit of weight, Gladys from extreme stress and depression and Jamie due to her serious illness. Jamie stated that she was told by the doctor that 6 catheter infections was much too much and that she never should have had so many temporary catheters, which blew out all of her veins where they were placed. She currently has a shunt in her groin which is extremely painful and must be surgically removed next week. She is scheduled to stay in her old cell until Friday, at which time she is told that she will be returned to the hospital.

Both Jamie and Gladys want all of their supporters to know that our activities are very greatly appreciated and that they want us to keep on! Mrs. Rasco and family are also very thankful and hopeful that together we can get those women released from this horrific
situation soon! If we keep pushing and use our creativity to call attention to this case, it will happen! If you write, then write about it; if you sing, sing about it; poet about it; creatively perform about it; print out flyers and distribute them at programs and events, however you can do it, please help get the word out about the plight of these women, there's something that every one can do!

The Days of Blogging for the Scott Sisters that happened on 3/18 and is so wonderfully happening again today will really help get the word out on the case in wider and broader areas of the internet and hopefully lead to much more support and national attention! Thanks so much to all of the participants and we will be posting links to all of the blogs that participated at the Scott Sisters site, so please send them in so that you can be acknowledged! Of course everyone is encouraged to continue blogging beyond today and please do!
~~~~~

We still don't trust that Jamie will receive adequate medical care once these hospitalizations are completed, which was proven by the fact that as soon as she was returned from the hospital yesterday she was put right back in that moldy building where she was originally housed!

JAMIE SCOTT NEEDS TO BE HOUSED IN THE MEDICAL BUILDING.

Someone as seriously ill as Jamie needs to be somewhere that she can get assistance in better living conditions, and that's not in the infirmary and definitely not in her original cell. The Medical Bldg. would give her access to her sister, Gladys, who would help her with her activities of daily living and monitor her condition, just as other family members incarcerated together there are permitted to do with less life-threatening
illnesses than Jamie suffers.

We must keep pushing for media attention to what's going on and are continually pressing for nationwide press. A complete and in-depth examination of this travesty of justice must be exposed!! Please forward all of the info at the site to anyone, anywhere that can help to make that happen, the Scott Sisters need to go prime-time to apply enough pressure to make this Gov. do the right thing.

Jane Velez-Mitchell should do an entire segment on the Scott Sisters now that she is aware of the case, please contact her and urge her to follow-up her brief mention of the Scott Sisters on her 3/6 "Issues with Jane Velez-Mitchell" with a more significant segment that will focus on Jamie's serious medical condition and the Scott Sisters case period. The contact form is at http://www.facebook.com/l/c3cc4;www.cnn.com/feedback/tips/newstips.html

EDITED FROM SCOTT SISTERS LIST SERVE

Ohio Learns the Lessons of Wrongful Conviction

From: Change.org
By Matt Kelly
March 20, 2010

The Ohio House of Representatives this week passed sweeping reforms addressing the causes of wrongful conviction, setting a new standard for other states to follow in preventing this unimaginable -- but very real -- injustice.

The bill addresses evidence preservation, eyewitness identification procedures, recording of interrogations and improved access to DNA testing. It gained momentum in the wake of a groundbreaking series in the Columbus Dispatch highlighting cases of Ohio prisoners unable to obtain DNA tests that could prove them innocent.

SB 77 passed both chambers of the Ohio legislature with near-unanimous bipartisan support, and Gov. Ted Strickland is expected to sign it into law with a few days.

Ohio Rep. Tyrone Yates, who sponsored the bill in the House, called this bill "one of the most important pieces of criminal justice legislation in this state in a century.”

# The bill puts Ohio out ahead of many other states on four major reforms to prevent wrongful convictions and overturn injustice, including: Requiring the preservation of DNA evidence in serious crimes (such as homicide and sexual assault), because post-conviction reviews can't be conducted when evidence has been tossed.

# Improving lineup procedures to significantly reduce the chance of misidentification, the leading cause of wrongful conviction.

# Incentivizing police departments to recording interrogations, a safeguard that prevents false confessions and a technique that helps law enforcement agencies conduct more efficient investigations

# Allowing parolees to apply for DNA testing in cases where it could potentially prove their innocence.

The Dispatch series that helped bring about these reforms has also led to two DNA exonerations so far, and other cases are in testing. The Innocence Network announced this week that the series' two lead reporters, Mike Wagner and Geoff Dutton, will be given the group's first annual Investigative Journalism Award in April.

With this bill, Ohio moves to the forefront on smart reforms to prevent injustice and improve efficiency in law enforcement and in courts. No one wants the innocent to go to prison. Wrongful convictions destroy lives and communities and leave the real perpetrators of crime on the streets. Kudos to Ohio for learning the lessons of injustice and making these critical changes.

Thank you from Jamie Scott's Mom.

I know some of you out there hit the links in the posts below to email folks in Mississippi - thank you. It mattered. Jamie is in the hospital now. 


Please keep following the Scott Sisters' case and do what you can. They need to go home.

-------------------------

1/22 JAMIE SCOTT MOVED TO HOSPITAL!
 
BREAKING NEWS!!! 

JUST CONFIRMED THAT JAMIE SCOTT IS IN CENTRAL MISSISSIPPI MEDICAL CENTER, JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI!! Gladys Scott called their mother, Mrs. Rasco, and told her that Jamie was moved earlier today and had surgery to place a shunt where she will begin to receive dialysis. According to one of the guards she is doing OK at this point in time. We will definitely keep everyone updated every time we are aware of a new development. The outpouring of love that was showered on Jamie and Mrs. Rasco from around the world was truly incredible, fantastic and wonderful; thank you doesn't begin to express the gratitude that this family feels for what you've accomplished. Mrs. Rasco wants everyone who called, faxed or e-mailed to know that it was due to your ceaseless efforts that this happened, and she is very, very grateful to each and everyone of you that participated in this call to action! Together we can bring them home to their families where they belong!!

URGENT: Mississippi DOC and Jamie Scott

Hey All: This just came in. I just left a message on the medical director's line from AZ Prison Watch/myself asserting Jamie's right to medical care and insisting that she be transferred to a hospital immediately. We will be following up. Please call in, as indicated below. Will work on the media, too. Can use help today.



-------------

David Hope Rosser sent a message to the members of Free The Scott Sisters.

--------------------

Subject: BRAND NEW INFO - 1/20 JAMIE SCOTT UPDATE!


The prison chaplain arranged for Jamie to call Mrs. Rasco today and in that phone call Jamie confirmed that both of her kidneys have shut down and that she is in the prison ICU. She told her mother that she will be taken to the hospital sometime next week to have a procedure performed so that she can begin dialysis. She did not know why this is being delayed and neither does the family!

Jamie is grateful for all of the supporters who have called into the prison but wants us to ask folks to discontinue the phone calls. It's being stressed to Jamie that callers who yell and cuss are upsetting the officials there.

Jamie Scott, at age 38, has aged tremendously since her 15+ years of unjust incarceration and now suffers from severe medical problems which have led to her kidneys shutting down. She needs immediate hospitalization for treatment, proper diagnoses and pain relief. Jamie also  has mental health needs which need to be evaluated and  treated, as well! WE FEEL STRONGLY THAT TIME IS  OF THE ESSENCE. Jamie Scott is inmate #19197 at the  Central Mississippi Correctional Facility and she is  being treated by Dr. Gloria Perry at (601) 359-5515.

We've just been advised by our legal support to keep the pressure on the prison and not to let up one bit! Despite the prison's manipulation of Jamie, we must continue to act and not stop. So keep those calls coming in, we must get Jamie out of there ASAP. We are making moveson many other fronts to make that happen an...d this is a very integral part.

DON'T CURSE OR YELL INTO THE PHONE. STATE PLAINLY AND CLEARLY THAT WE WANT JAMIE MOVED OUT OF THE PRISON AND INTO A HOSPITAL WITHOUT FURTHER DELAY, THIS IS CRUCIAL! JAMIE SCOTT, #19197, MUST BE TAKEN TO THE HOSPITAL IMMEDIATELY!

Her physical and mental state require the highest levels of professional care.

Dr. Gloria Perry, Medical Department
(601) 359-5515

Margaret Bingham,
Superintendent of Central Mississippi Corrections Facility
(601) 932-2880
mbingham@mdoc.state.ms.us


FAX: (601) 664-0782
P.O. Box 88550
Pearl, Mississippi 39208

Christopher Epps, Commissioner of Prisons for the State of Mississippi
601-359-5600
CEPPS@mdoc.state.ms.us

North President Street
Jackson, MS 39202

Emmitt Sparkman, Deputy Commissioner

(601) 359-5610

esparkman@mdoc.state.ms.us 

http://state.ms.us

 

Please reply back to us and let us know of every response you get so that we can keep track of what people are being told.

Congressman Bennie Thompsom

Washington, D.C. Office

2432 Rayburn HOB

Washington, D.C. 20515

(202) 225-5876(202) 225-5898 (Fax)

 

Jackson, Mississippi Office

3607 Medgar Evers Blvd

Jackson, MS 39213

(601) 946-9003(601)-982-5337 (Fax)

 

Congressman Alcee L. Hastings

 Washington Office

2353 Rayburn Office Building

Washington D.C. 20515

Tel: (202) 225-1313

Fax: (202) 225-1171

 

Congressman Jeff Miller

Washington D.C.

2439 Rayburn House Office Building

Washington DC 20515

Phone: (202) 225-4136

Fax: (202) 225-3414

Toll Free Phone Number to District Office

Pensacola, Florida Phone: 866-367-1614 

 

NBC TODAY SHOW: Today@NBCUNI.com

 

NBC NIGHTLY NEWS: Nightly@NBC.com

 

Listing of NBC/MSNBC Show e-mails at http://www.facebook.com/l/f98b2;www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10285339/

NBC News

30 Rockefeller Plaza

New York, N.Y. 10112

Phone: (212) 664-4444 Fax: 

(212) 664-4426 

 

CBS FEEDBACK FORM: http://www.facebook.com/l/f98b2;www.cbs.com/info/user_services/fb_global_form.php

CBS NEWS

524 W. 57 St., 

New York, NY 10019 

Phone: 212-975-4321 

Fax: 212-975-1893

 

ABC NEWS CONTACT FORM: http://www.facebook.com/l/f98b2;abcnews.go.com/Site/page?id=3271346&cat=Good%20Morning%20America

ABC NEWS

77 W. 66 St., 

New York, NY 10023 

Phone: 212-456-7777 

 

CNN NEWS TIP FORM: http://www.facebook.com/l/f98b2;www.cnn.com/feedback/tips/newstips.html

CNN

One CNN Center, 

Box 105366, Atlanta, GA 30303-5366 Phone: 404-827-1500 Fax: 404-827-1784 

 

USA Today

7950 Jones Branch Dr.,

McLean, VA 22108 

Phone: 703-854-3400

Fax: 703-854-2078

 

Associated Press

450 West 33rd St., 

New York, NY 10001 

Phone: 212-621-1500 

Fax: 212-621-7523

General Questions and Comments: info@ap.org 

http://www.facebook.com/l/

 

http://www.

freethescottsisters.blogspot.com

Prisoner Solidarity: Urgent Call-in for Jamie Scott.

These women were thrown away fifteen years ago - for life. They don't mean anything to the state. They're worth a lot to their families, though - and could probably do a lot of good for the rest of us educating others about wrongful convictions, racism, and harsh sentencing practices.

I've posted about the Scott Sisters before - here's a link to a brief article in Huffington about them. Please take a minute and call the folks in Mississippi - you'll probably just get a voice mailbox, as I did. Leave your message anyway - they'll be counting them up. 

I've been in touch with this prison before, and they respond, but not with anything meaningful - just PR stuff.  Let Mississippi know you want Jamie to get the best medical care there is, immediately, and that her sister should be allowed to be by her side. Go for Epps - confront him on the BS about the excess cost of Gladys providing the kidney.

Here's the link to an article in the SF Bay View about Jamie's son and his efforts to liberate them both.

We have got to figure out a way to get all these people free from prison.

After you do your part, hit their blogspot or facebook page and leave a message, or send their mom, Mrs. Rascoe, a quick email letting her know what you did (rqueenbee2222@yahoo.com). It matters to her spirit, too, to know that people out here are responding to their calls for help. They need us to come through for them, and it really doesn't take much...

---------

Subject: 1/18/10 EMERGENCY ACTION ALERT! ~ Jamie Is In Need of Immediate Medical Attention

1/18/10 EMERGENCY ACTION ALERT!

Mrs. Rasco just received a phone call from Gladys Scott that both of Jamie Scott's kidneys have shut down and that she has been in the prison infirmary since last Saturday hooked up to IV fluids with a heavy build-up of toxins in her body.  Jamie has yet to be sent to a hospital due to "paperwork."  Jamie pleaded that Gladys not contact their mother because she didn't want to burden her with anymore worry on top of caring for all of the children.

Gladys has offered to donate a kidney to Jamie and was told that she cannot because she is a state prisoner
and that it would be too expensive.  The greatest heartbreak of all is that Jamie has asked to be allowed
to die because she wants to come home so badly and no longer believes that it will ever happen.

JAMIE SCOTT, #19197, MUST BE TAKEN TO THE HOSPITAL IMMEDIATELY!  Her physical and mental state require the highest levels of professional care.

Margaret Bingham, Superintendent of Central Mississippi Corrections Facility
(601) 932-2880
mbingham@mdoc.http://www.facebook.com/l/cc872;state.ms.us
FAX: (601) 664-0782
P.O. Box 88550
Pearl, Mississippi 39208

Christopher Epps, Commissioner of Prisons for the State of Mississippi
601-359-5600
CEPPS@mdoc.http://www.facebook.com/l/cc872;state.ms.us
723 North President Street
Jackson, MS  39202

Emmitt Sparkman, Deputy Commissioner
(601) 359-5610
esparkman@mdoc.http://www.facebook.com/l/cc872;state.ms.us