Authorities wanted her for escaping from a Detroit prison a year into a maximum year sentence on heroin charges. Now, LeFevre, 53, is in jail awaiting extradition from California to Michigan on an escape warrant. Authorities say her cover was blown by an anonymous caller who tipped Michigan authorities to her new name.
LeFevre, who grew up the second of five children, was just 19 when she was arrested during an undercover drug operation in Thomas Township, outside Saginaw, Mich. She said she got into drugs after graduating from her Catholic high school because she was despondent over the death of her teenage sweetheart in the Vietnam War. Her parents, strict Catholics who took away her John Lennon albums and prohibited their daughter from wearing faded blue jeans, encouraged her to plead guilty to spare the family the embarrassment of a court trial.
LeFevre said she agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy and violation of drug laws in hopes of winning leniency from the judge but was given the maximum sentence of 10 to 20 years.
One night, she decided she had to leave. Her grandfather and another relative agreed to meet her, and in February LeFevre walked across an open yard, threw her jacket over a barbed wire fence and climbed over, then started running.
You don't think about fear, you don't have time. You just run," she said. A few weeks later, friends let her ride with them to California, where she went by Marie, her middle name.
LeFevre said only a few people knew about her secret past. She said she told a fiance, who broke their engagement. She decided to keep it secret when she married her husband of 23 years, Alan Walsh. The Saginaw native was arrested in on drug charges.
At the time heroin was a huge problem and anyone caught with it could face decades in prison. That is what happened to Walsh. At the time she was known by her birth name, Susan LeFevre, and she claimed she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was still sent to prison, but managed to escape. She assumed a new life and identity in San Diego where she got married and had three children and a beautiful home.
A tip led police to her in , when she was extradited back to prison in Michigan. Less than half a year later, the parole board voted to release her, allowing her to go back to the life she built in San Diego. Walsh said Kim Kardashian West's success with getting President Trump to pardon Alice Marie Johnson, a year-old woman who was sentenced to life in prison in after a nonviolent drug offense , impacted and inspired Walsh.
Now Walsh wants to draw attention to Cowan's story. Like Walsh and Johnson, Cowan is also a nonviolent drug offender who has spent years imprisoned, but now there could be hope. I met her 10 years ago," Walsh said. Cowan is held in a state prison, which makes her ineligible for a presidential pardon like Johnson received.
Her release is dependent on a local judge or the governor. It's Walsh's hope that those who support Cowan's release will write letters of support. There is a long history of presidents issuing pardons -- some of those granted had prior personal relationships with the sitting president and others are cases cases that garner a lot of public attention and support, like Johnson's. Walsh is continuing her work to help inmates, but her life has also taken a turn. The last Local 4 spoke with her, Walsh settled back into her life with her husband and children.
Now she's in a small apartment and separated from her family.
0コメント