Before the race-baiting left — equally black and white — drowns America in tears over the plight of the supposedly mistreated Scott sisters of Mississippi, let us look closer at their case.
I am trying to determine whether they were mistreated or got what they deserved.
The undisputed news is that 38-year-old Jamie and 36-year-old Gladys Scott, who are black, are scheduled to be released from a Mississippi prison in mid-February, having served 16 years for their role in an armed stickup.
Gov. Haley Barbour announced last Thursday he was suspending their twin life sentences, effective relatively immediately, on the condition the younger sister donate a kidney to her big sister who has been described as “seriously ill.”
The hysterical noise machines on the left have been howling ever since, as if someone were standing on their tails. Once again they have carried out their mandate to obscure the truth with showers of emotion.
Right on Schedule. Evidence? Foo.
Like starving cats involuntarily lodged atop a rickety, piercing fence at midnight, the emotion-first left — beginning with predictable Bob Herbert of The New Year Times — protested that well, yes, the girls may have done the dirty deed. But no one was hurt. Besides, the girls and the three punks they stooged for only netted $11 (which might buy a new car in Mississippi). What is the line of demarcation in Ole Miss? Twelve dollars? Thirteen?
Nationally, there have been three foci since Gov. Barbour’s verdict — the alleged tiny tote from the flubbed stickup, 11 smackers, the claim that no one was hurt, and the unique contingency of the sisters’ release, which some medical ethicists have questioned.
By reasoning of the Scotts’ supporters, if you stick up a joint but can’t steal as much as you intended, hey, no punishment should be meted out. Everybody, as Swishie, our misguided messiah, said last week, deserves a second chance.
Serious left-wingers, by contrast, starting with President Ben Jealous of the NAACP, have been thanking Gov. Barbour for bailing the Scotts.
So where does the truth lie?
I combed Mississippi media for insight on the case. Zero results. I was again reminded that the only reason ever to visit Mississippi, electronically or physically, is to reach the next state. Newspapers there think “insight” is what you charge to someone who screams to ignite a riot.
The 11 bucks and the kidney condition and the assertion no one was hurt only are meant to befog the picture — and the yahoos have succeeded.
Here Is What Actually Happened
How sentimental are the Scott sisters?
Consider this:
On Christmas Eve night in 1993 when normal mommies are readying for Santa, the Scott sisters — 21 and 19 at the time — duped two men into an ambush where their three teenage collaborators whacked each gentleman on the head and gingerly relieved him of his wallet.
Keep in mind that one sister had two small children at home and the other was pregnant.
The fun began at the unparental hour of 10:30 on Christmas Eve night.
A car with five young people, two females and three males, roared into a convenience store parking lot.
As the Daily Beast relates the scenario, the Scott sisters stepped out, entered the store, approached two soft-looking marks and suggested they all go for a ride.
We are told the dupes could see that there were fellows in the car the girls had been riding in. Surely a kindergartner would have smelled a mouse if not a rat. But, hey, a good time had been promised.
Once the ride was under way, the not-too-sharp men, entranced by the Scott sisters, noticed the girls’ car was following them. Hmm.
They stopped at a nightclub so the sisters could use the restroom. Surrounded by warning flags, the dim dudes ignored them and innocently waited.
When Gladys returned, she wanted to drive. Hmm. They cruised until Jamie complained of being carsick. The dim dude who owned the car asked Gladys to stop because he didn’t want a prospective lover vomiting in his cool car. Hmm. The car stopped. So did the sisters’ three male companions in their tailing car.
In the kindergarten-style robbery, the three teen thugs who were trailing the Scott girls and their dupes bailed out, kerplunked each dim dude on his empty head and swiftly removed his billfold.
Was it just 11 smackers they collected? One of the dim dudes who practically volunteered to be a victim claimed he had $200 in his wallet. Hmmm.
The five brilliant apprentice criminals were arrested the same night.
With one of the Scott girls pregnant at the time and the other already with children, you may properly wonder why they weren’t they home, taking care of themselves and the kiddies instead of conspiring to participate in the Ignorant Crime of the Year?
If these budding criminals shrewdly selected two bum chaps who had 11 one-dollar bills between them, the punks surely deserve to go to jail for 10 years for being the dumbest things on two legs in Mississippi — and if you ever have been there, that is an ambitious claim.
A mom and a budding mom who willingly participate in this Marx Brothers armed holdup should go broke trying to win more than a drop of pity.
At bottom, based on the thin plate of evidence available, the Scott sisters indeed seem to have been overpunished. But before your eyes well up, their own abiding stupidity begged for a penalty.
Sadly, there is no public evidence that the sisters yet have learned a life lesson from their abysmal judgment 17 years later.
