WOMAN MAINTAINS HOPE FOR BETTER PRISON CARE

OKLAHOMA CITY -- For Karen Linduff, the empty chair at Christmas dinner
will be hard to bear.

"I have nearly grieved myself to death," Linduff said. "It is not getting
better. It is getting harder because of the holidays. One more time,
Karrie's seat will be empty at Christmas. That is heartbreaking for all of us.

"Her hope was that she could make it. She had plans on what she was going
to get everyone this year."

It has taken the 55-year-old mother of three several weeks to talk about
her daughter, Karrie Linduff, 36, who died Oct. 22 at Tulsa Regional
Medical Center after a battle with cancer.

Karrie was featured in an April Tulsa World series addressing prison
medical care.

After being released from the Mabel Bassett Correctional Center on Dec. 17,
1998, Karrie went to live with her parents in Claremore.

She told the Tulsa World that while she was in prison she repeatedly sought
medical treatment for what she thought was cancer. While a corrections
official said Karrie was treated appropriately, her family thinks a lack of
treatment ultimately led to her death.

Upon her release, Karrie -- who had been in and out of prison for crimes
such as attempted arson and attempting to obtain a controlled drug by a
forged prescription -- was diagnosed with cancer of the ovaries and uterus.

She underwent surgery, chemotherapy and numerous radiation treatments.

Doctors gave her two months to live, but she managed to stretch that to 10
months, her mother said.

She lived in agony," Linduff said. "That girl suffered so much."

But Karrie always believed she'd beat the illness, Linduff said.

If she had lived, Karrie hoped to become a respiratory therapist, a
profession she viewed as a way to help others.

Linduff hopes that eventually the Oklahoma Department of Corrections will
start providing adequate medical care for inmates. Her daughter worried
about the women she left behind in prison.

"Karrie deserved to have medical care and did not get it," she said. "No
one can go back and change that."

In the end, Karrie forgave those she blamed for not treating her, Linduff
said.

"She sat down and wept and said, `God help me forgive them, because I don't
want nothing to stop me from going to heaven,' " Linduff said. "It is a
little harder for me."

Linduff said she asked God for a sign so she could find peace. She wanted
to know Karrie was in heaven.

"You will never believe what came by UPS: a quilt Karrie and a friend had
made in 1989," she said. Karrie and the friend had made the quilt in
prison, and the friend had it sent to Linduff.

Linduff has a plan for the future -- a plan she hopes will make a
difference in the lives of people who, like Karrie, have made mistakes.

Linduff's passion is singing the gospel.

She plans to visit Oklahoma prisons to share her talent and Karrie's story.

"I think it is going to help me have closure and healing to go and minister
to people like her," Linduff said. "I have a love for them. They are
somebody's kids. They are not monsters. Some may seem that way.

"Karrie said some of the best (people) she knew were in prison. They just
made those mistakes. They are paying for it now. They deserve a chance to
change and turn their lives around."

Linduff wants people to know that drugs and prison cut her daughter's life
abruptly short.

"Karrie has touched a lot of people, and she's been gone two months,"
Linduff said. "That is the high point. Karrie still is talking beyond the
grave."