Freedom for the Scott sisters

JAMIE AND Gladys Scott are finally free--after serving nearly 17 years in a Mississippi prison--thanks to activism on the part of family members and friends, criminal justice and civil rights organizations, and individual supporters in Mississippi and across the country.

But Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour wants to make sure that the Scott sisters don't feel completely free yet.

In prison, Jamie Scott--a healthy 22-year-old when she got there--suffered repeated infections and was eventually hospitalized as a result of the unsanitary conditions. Now she has lost renal function in her kidneys, and won't survive without a transplant.

Last week, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour announced that he would suspend--but not commute--the two women's sentences, on the condition that Gladys donate a kidney to her sick sister within a year.

"I'm praying to God that I'm a match," Gladys, who said that she would have given the kidney to her sister no matter what, told reporters.

If anyone thinks that Barbour is showing a previously unnoticed human side, think again. The cynical Barbour had the nerve to cite the expense of providing Jamie's dialysis in prison--$200,000 a year--as reason for his decision.

As part of their release, the women will be on probation for the rest of their lives. And Barbour has stipulated that if Jamie's operation doesn't take place as planned, both sisters could be sent back in prison. They don't even know if Gladys is an organ match yet.

THE SCOTT sisters' case is one of the worse examples of a criminal justice system that runs roughshod over poor and working people's lives--African Americans in particular.

In 1994, each of the sisters was given outlandish double-life sentences for their supposed role in an $11 robbery in which no one was hurt. From the beginning, the two denied any involvement in the crime, and until then, they had never been charged with a crime.

Their convictions were based largely on the testimony of three teenagers who claim that the sisters helped lure two men into a trap, where their wallets were stolen. When the teenagers were first arrested for the crime, they pled guilty and didn't even mention the Scotts.

But by the time a plea deal had been reached, the Scott sisters were now part of the crime, and the teenagers testified against them in court. One boy, who was just 14 years old, described how the authorities coerced him into testifying: "They said if I didn't participate with them, they would send me to Parchman [Mississippi State Penitentiary] and make me out a female."

The boys received much shorter sentences after they testified against the sisters, and were released after serving two years.

Some supporters believe that a vendetta begun by a local sheriff demanding a bribe from the Scott family that they refused to pay led to the sisters becoming the target of a frame-up.

On top of everything else, the sisters were represented by incompetent lawyers who failed to interview and subpoena witnesses. Several witness could have been asked to take the stand; the attorneys called just one. They also told the sisters not to testify on their own behalf, denying Jamie and Gladys the chance to speak for themselves.

This outrageous double-life sentence for the Scott sisters makes even more sense when you know the record of the judge who oversaw the case. Justice Marcus Gordon hasn't always been such a harsh purveyor of justice--especially when the accused is a Klansman.

Gordon is the same judge who sentenced Edgar Ray Killen, the Ku Klux Klan member who murdered civil rights activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner in 1964, to 20-year sentences. The racist terrorist Killen was allowed to go free while he appealed the judge's decision.

In prison, the sisters were harassed by guards, and about a year ago, Jamie was stripped of her privileges to attend school, work or conduct research in the law library. Increasingly, prison officials failed to provide Jamie the dialysis, nutrition and medical care that she needed to survive.

When news of their release was made public, authorities didn't even bother to tell the sisters--they found out from the prison television.

Activism and grassroots organizing played a key role in keeping the Scott Sisters case in the news and applying pressure on Barbour. Petition drives, letter-writing and demonstrations were organized through grassroots organizing, like Nancy Lockhart's Free the Scott Sister blog. In September, hundreds of people marched through downtown Jackson from the state capitol to the governor's mansion.

The NAACP, which was behind a petition campaign in support of the Scott sisters, is organizing a victory celebration for April 1. But while there is definitely cause for celebration, there is also cause for criticism of Mississippi's cruel and cold-hearted policies.

As New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, who wrote several articles in defense of the sisters, pointed out, "I was happy for the Scott sisters...But I couldn't help thinking that right up until the present moment she and Jamie have been treated coldly and disrespectfully by the governor and other state officials. It's as if the authorities have found it impossible to hide their disdain, their contempt, for the two women."

Herbert concludes, "The Scott sisters may go free, but they will never receive justice."

Jamie's and Gladys' five kids were small children at the time of their arrest--now some of them have children of their own.

"I believe that's when I'm going to break down," said Gladys, describing to reporters what it will be like to see their family again, including her mother who has long sought their release. "That's when reality is going to sink in for me."

Activists will have to keep up the organizing to make sure that Barbour doesn't decide to send Jamie and Gladys back to prison--and to help them win the complete freedom and justice that they deserve.