It was a race against the clock for an elderly Michigan woman serving a life sentence while she battled Stage 4 lung cancer.
Theresa Dunlap, 67, wanted her to live out her final days surrounded by loved ones, but her supporters claim the prison’s inaction caused her to die alone in her cell.
“We fought hard to get her released,” Machelle Pearson said.
Pearson spent 34 years in prison alongside Dunlap until she was paroled. She is among several supporters of Dunlap who hoped she would have received a medical release from prison after her diagnosis.
“The prison system wouldn’t release her medical file. They stated the doctors never sent a letter to the governor, and a letter was sent,” Pearson said.
The Michigan Department of Corrections denies those allegations. A spokesperson for MDOC told Atlanta Black Star Dunlap was “on full vigil status at the time of her passing.”
MDOC also said “the parole board didn’t have to request [Dunlap’s medical file] because it already had it and “the report was shared with the governor’s office along with the board’s recommendations.”
“Her health is quickly deteriorating,” Dunlap’s supporters said in a letter to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer last June.
In December, Dunlap discovered her lung cancer had progressed to Stage 4, according to a letter of support from a coalition of prisoner and civil rights advocates, lawmakers and current and former inmates, the Detroit Free Press reported. They also claimed Dunlap had COVID-19 and that “mold grew in her chemo port.”
The cancer had “spread to her brain and spine, and a large mass was recently discovered in her chest and back,” Dunlap’s supporters said.
“My mother has been in there for 46 years,” Dunlap’s son, Marsay Dunlap, told the Detroit Free Press.
With Dunlap’s deteriorating health, she petitioned the Michigan parole board for an early release when she was eligible to apply. Most parole…
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