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January 10, 2011

Scott Sisters Freed After Serving 16 Years in Prison for $11 Robbery 
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In Mississippi, two African American sisters were freed Friday from life
sentences in jail for an $11 armed robbery. The sisters, Gladys and
Jamie Scott, had spent 16 years in prison. The NAACP and other civil
rights groups had campaigned for years for their freedom. Mississippi
Governor Haley Barbour suspended their sentences on condition that
Gladys donate a kidney to her sister, who is on dialysis.

Gladys Scott: "You know, I'm praying to God that I am a match, because I
don't want her to have nobody else's kidney. I want her to have mine.
Whether I was, you know, released because I had to give her a kidney, I
was going to give it to her anyway if I had to give it to her in prison.
Didn't nobody had to release me, because if they would have let me give
it to her when her kidney first failed, I would have gave it to her
without a shadow of a doubt. I love my sister."

Jamie Scott, 36, reflected on Friday about how much the world has
changed since they were sent to prison in 1994.

Jamie Scott: "Last night, I didn't sleep at all last night. I see
pictures of stuff in magazines, different things, as the world is
changing and everything—cell phones, up-to-date cell phones and
all these things. And today, I've done used mostly everybody's cell
phone that's with me. I just wanted to touch them, and I've been playing
with them and everything. And it's so amazing, you know, how the world
has changed since 1994. And up to today, it is so amazing, and I'm still
trying to soak it all in."



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