Shannon Hurd Got a Life Sentence for Stealing $14. Then He Died in Prison from Untreated Cancer.

Summary: When Ilene Hurd Smoot’s brother went to prison in 2004, she was angry at him at first. Their parents had strived to raise them right; their father was a deacon at their childhood church in Mississippi and the siblings sang in the choir. “They were hardworking people,” Ilene said. “They didn’t steal. They worked for everything they had.” Her brother, Shannon Hurd, was mischievous growing up, she says, but he had never done anything to hurt anyone.