She died after contracting cancer in prison. A bill was just signed into law in response to her story
By Michael Goldberg and Mina Corpuz | Originally published by Mississippi Today
Gov. Tate Reeves signed a bill into law this week that will require the Mississippi Department of Corrections to supply protective equipment to incarcerated people who are forced to use strong cleaning chemicals while working in prison.
House Bill 1444, which passed both chambers in bipartisan, near-unanimous votes, made it across the finish line after dying in the Senate last year. It was inspired by Susie Balfour, a formerly incarcerated Mississippi woman who died last year from terminal breast cancer, a condition she said she contracted after exposure to cleaning chemicals in prison. She learned about the disease two weeks before her 2021 release from prison.
The measure was authored by Rep. Justis Gibbs, a Democrat from Jackson, who applauded the governor’s decision to sign the bill, and said it stood out as meaningful, bipartisan legislation in a year when many other reforms died.
“I stood on the federal courthouse steps with Ms. Susie Balfour and promised I wouldn’t stop until this became law. She stood there in pain, fighting for basic protection that was denied to her,” Gibbs said. “This is for her. We must treat every citizen with dignity in Mississippi, incarcerated or not.”
During more than 30 years of incarceration, Balfour used cleaning chemicals without protective gear, which likely contributed to her cancer, she argued in a 2024 federal lawsuit.
She placed blame on the prison health system’s current and former health care providers for failing to diagnose and treat the cancer for years, including not taking her for recommended mammograms and waiting until 2021 to take a biopsy, which ultimately confirmed the diagnosis.
One of the entities named in the lawsuit is VitalCore Health Strategies, the state’s current prison medical contractor. The Kansas-based company has been the subject of other litigation from current and former prisoners alleging inadequate care, and some lawmakers have attempted to pass laws that could lead to its replacement as the prison medical contractor.
“I just want everybody to be held accountable,” Balfour told Mississippi Today in 2021. “ … and I just want justice for myself and other ladies and men in there who are dealing with the same situation I am dealing with.”
Similar cancer diagnoses and delayed care might not have been isolated to Balfour. An earlier version of her lawsuit alleged at least 15 other incarcerated women contracted cancer after using cleaning materials at the Mississippi women’s prison and similarly had their diagnoses and care withheld, but some of those women are not plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
Balfour’s lawsuit remains active in court even after her death. The court allowed her to give a deposition months before her passing to preserve her testimony for the case. Balfour’s sister Shirley, who is also the executrix of her estate, has taken over as the plaintiff in the suit. Balfour’s son, Duwan, also joined the lawsuit as the wrongful death beneficiary.
Although several defendants have been dismissed, the court is still considering claims against a number of defendants including the current and former prison health care companies, a doctor, and unnamed physicians and nurses who treated Balfour.
Discovery is underway, and the trial is scheduled for October.
Balfour was convicted of capital murder in 1989 for shooting Southaven Police Lt. Billy Lance, who stopped her and her boyfriend after a convenience store robbery. She received a death sentence, but it was overturned years later because the Mississippi Supreme Court found her constitutional rights were violated during trial.
She accepted a plea agreement for a lesser charge and was resentenced, her attorney said.
When Gibbs caught wind of her story, he drafted legislation during the 2025 session to prevent other prisoners from suffering a similar fate. The bill died in the Senate, but he tried again this year, and the first-term Democrat ultimately advanced the only prison health care reform to survive legislative negotiations this session.
The Senate again blocked most of the proposals to improve health care in Mississippi’s prisons, which were driven in part by findings from an ongoing Mississippi Today investigation.
Rep. Becky Currie, the House Corrections chairwoman driving the push for reforms, said she will try again next session.
“I want to thank Speaker Jason White and Chairwoman Becky Currie for their hard work and leadership shown to improve inmate conditions here in Mississippi,” Gibbs said. “There is still much work to do.”
This article was originally published by Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Source: Original Article
