To Be Released, Inmate Must Give a Kidney to Sister

A Mississippi inmate will have her life sentence suspended, as long as she abides by one interesting condition: She must donate a kidney to her sister. Jamie and Gladys Scott were convicted in 1994 of baiting two men into an armed robbery, in which only $11 was stolen. The sisters have spent 16 years behind bars while civil rights advocates have condemned their sentences as too excessive, the AP reports. Gladys, 36, came up with the idea to give her kidney to Jamie, 38, who is on daily dialysis.

Sentence suspensions come with conditions, unlike a pardon or a commutation, and can be reversed if the conditions—usually things like making parole meetings—are not met. The Mississippi NAACP is happy with the outcome, and says the condition is fine since Gladys volunteered. "She wanted to do it," says a spokesperson for Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, who suspended the sisters’ sentences yesterday. "That wasn't something we introduced."
(More prison sentence stories.)