http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/31/mississippi-sisters-parole-kidney

OK, so two sisters who were sentenced to life in prison for participating in an armed robbery back in '93 have been granted parole by the Governor of Mississippi, on the condition that one sister donate a kidney to the other.

I had never heard of this story before, but people apparently held up this story of two black women convicted of armed robbery as a key example of the racist state of Mississippi.  Here's the brief rundown:

The two gals hitched a ride with a couple of black dudes, and at some point one of the gals asked the driver to stop so she could puke.  At that point, three of the gals' black male buddies stormed the car, armed with guns, and robbed the car's occupants of $11 (some accounts say that it was  few hundred dollars).  The girls naturally claim that they had nothing to do with the crime and that their buddies just happened to show up at the scene when the girl puked.  Everybody went to trial; the guys received fairly short sentences and the two gals (who set up the whole thing) got life; the guys ratted out the girls' participation in order to get some leniency.  The jury was multiracial.

So on with the issues:


How is it a case of racism when a multiracial jury convicts five black people of robbing two other black people?  If either the victims or conspirators were of different races, OK, I could see that.
How does the amount of money stolen have any relevance in an ARMED ROBBERY case?  I know that if somebody jacked my car and pulled a roscoe on me, I would be no less in danger if I was carrying $11 than I would be if I had $11,000.
Supporters of these two ladies seem to lean on the fact that they did not actually brandish the weapons.  But it is a long-established point of law that if one has participated in an armed assault, they are as guilty of armed assault as if they held the weapon themselves.


Now mind you, it certainly seems "unfair" that the ladies got more severe sentences than the guys, but after all, the ladies set up the whole robbery in the first place.  Boo hoo.

The kidney angle: I do not know why the kidney aspect had to be involved in the parole.  One would imagine they are being paroled because the Guv felt that they had paid their debt to society.  The kidney angle seems a bit weird to me.  Of course maybe the transplant woulda happened while the gals were in prison anyway, and the Guv just saved the good people of Mississippi several hundred thousand dollars.  But this too is doubtful, because these gals will be on welfare when they get out as I imagine they were before they got in (one having been a 12-year-old mother and the other having been a 15-year-old mother, neither ever married and 5 kids between them).  Government will be picking up the tab anyway.  Well, except for the kidney itself.

My money says we'll be hearing from these two ladies again in a few years.  Another crime.  Another set of claims of "racial injustice in the Deep South".

What say you? ???

The crime sounds dumber than hell.  Pretty desperate.  Are these ladies likely to likely to re-O-ffend?  Probably not after 17 years in the hoosegow. 

Economically, it's still going to be much cheaper to dole out welfare payments to the women and their kids than it is to keep them in the clink. 

This is Mississippi we're talking about....

Economically, it's still going to be much cheaper to dole out welfare payments to the women and their kids than it is to keep them in the clink. 


You got a point there, Max.