Susan LeFevre talks about prison life and about the violations levied against her while serving time for her escape from a Michigan prison in 1976.
“I was in with the worst of the worst,” LeFevre said in a phone interview with KGTV.
On Wednesday, a state parole board voted unanimously to release LeFevre on May 19. She was captured last April while living in an upscale neighborhood in Carmel Valley under the name Marie Walsh. The now-54-year-old was in prison for a heroin sale when she escaped after about 14 months.
LeFevre has been behind bars for nine months and has 11 misconducts since her capture. If she gets any more, her release may be delayed. She feels many of the violations were because of her confusion over prison rules.
“I’m a little concerned. It’s been rather hard for me because of the attention this has gotten,” she said. “I’ve been trying since I got here. I’ve done everything I could to work within the system.”
LeFevre said she received several tickets for trying to contact her attorney. Correction officers told her to get off the phone and while she was ending her call they still wrote her a “major ticket,” she said.
“Most of the officers are very professional but there are a number of them who have targeted me and singled me out and have come up with these so-called violations,” said LeFevre.
When asked about allegations from the Department of Corrections that she had threatened someone, LeFevre vehemently denied them.
“Absolutely untrue. I had many witnesses who have said that it’s absolutely untrue,” she said. “I was... assigned with another person, that had a history of violence and I had complained I had been threatened for weeks and I was asking to be moved.”
“It was just cruel what happened to me. I was shackled and put in a cell as if I had punched this person and it just didn’t happen. Everyone, a lot of witnesses, said that of course I didn’t do it. I’m certainly not going to threaten a 22-year old girl.”
“I felt I totally had no control over this,” she said. “I had to spend 7 days in a dungeon-type punishment room here until I was heard on it. It was a very painful experience.”
“There are certainly some nice women here but there are some dangerous people here. I was put with one and I think it was specifically done,” she said.
LeFevre hopes that her move to another part of the prison will help her avoid new violations while she waits for her release date.
Before the phone interview ended, LeFevre wanted to make sure her points of the correctional officers weren’t taken out of context.
“It’s a small number of people who would single me out. I don’t want to be left at risk,” she said.
