TWO DOUBLE-LIFE SENTENCES FOR $11.00!

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PRESS RELEASE

THE COMMITTEE TO FREE THE SCOTT SISTERS

CONTACT:

Mrs. Evelyn Rasco
P.O. Box 7100
Pensacola, Florida 32534
E-mail: rqueenbee2222@yahoo.com
Website: http://www.freethescottsisters.blogspot.com
Petition: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/Free-Jamie-Gladys/index.html
Case Summary: http://freethescottsisters.blogspot.com/2009/08/case-summary_19.html
Legal Transcripts: http://www.scribd.com/Scott%20Sisters

MISSISSIPPI INJUSTICE: A DOUBLE-LIFE SENTENCE FOR $11.00!

Scott County, MS ---- In a trial fraught with legal malpractice, lack of evidence and witness coercion, Mississippi Judge Marcus Gordon sentenced sisters Gladys and Jamie Scott to double-life each in an armed robbery. No matter the veracity of testimony; the lack of physical evidence and the absence of any previous criminal activity of the accused; in a questionable crime, where no one was murdered or harmed and the amount alleged to have been taken as a whopping $11.00, one has to ask if this is Mississippi, the state in the United States of America ? And, how does a court abdicate the national principles of justice and fair judicial process ?

On December 24, 1993, the Scott County Sheriff’s Department arrested the Scott sisters for armed robbery even though three persons confessed to committing the crime. The Mississippi sheriff used coercion, threats, and harassment to compel these individuals to become state’s evidence against the Scott sisters. His motive ? A long-standing vendetta against the Father of the sisters. Later a local teen, without benefit of counsel would testify that he was pressured to sign a written statement that he did not read and was prepared by the sheriff. No weapon was ever recovered in this case.

During the course of the short trial only one witness was called and the sisters at the direction of questionable legal advice, never testified or spoke for themselves during the course of their trial.

Jamie, now 38 and Gladys, 34 are now entering their 16th year of incarceration. Jamie has lost function of both kidneys and is gravely ill, being provided inadequate medical treatment may very well see her sentence as a death sentence unless the Mississippi Prison Commission relents in its rigid negligent medical care decisions for her. Recently, Jamie Scott was diagnosed by an outside physician as being at Stage 5 (end stage) of this illness, the next stage being death. Should Jamie Scott die in prison for an alleged robbery of $11.00 almost 16 years ago?

A national campaign has been undertaken by their elderly Mother, Mrs. Evelyn Rasco, to gain justice for her daughters and their family. Nationwide support for Jamie and Gladys is building increasingly louder and active.

Nancy Lockhart, the young woman who has acted as the spokesperson of the Free the Scott Sisters Campaign, and the Mother of Jamie and Gladys Scott are available for live and telephone interviews. They have been featured guests on the Warren Ballentine Show ( XM Radio The Power); Our Common Ground with Janice Graham ( USTalkNetwork); The Mark Thompson Show ( Sirius Radio The Left Side); The Rip Daniels Show, WJZD Mississippi; and their comments are featured in many newspapers across the country and throughout the blogosphere.

In June, 2009, Dr. Lenore J. Daniels, PhD of the Editorial Board of BlackCommentator.com wrote about the wrongfully conviction of Jamie and Gladys Scott in a featured editorial, titled, “Represent Our Resistance” and Mother Jones magazine's investigative reporter, James Ridgeway, did an exhaustive piece entitled, "Cruel and Unusual Health Care -- How Mississippi Prisoner Jamie Scott's Life Sentence Could Turn Into a Death Sentence."

Links to the Case Summary and archived Transcript of the trial are provided above.

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