Original Blog Entry: Thief gets jail instead of heart transplant

truesee — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 23:51:14 GMT

Shoplifting likely to cost woman her life as she loses spot on heart transplant list with sentence

Kathleen Lucadamo

DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thursday, September 29th 2011, 1:29 PM

Newsday

Diane McCloud appears in Nassau County court to plead guilty on shoplifting charges August 12, 2011 in Mineola, Long Island.

A serial shoplifter who was freed from jail so she could get a heart transplant was resentenced to more than two years on Wednesday because she stole again.

Diane McCloud, 47, of Hempstead, LI, was sprung in January to get on a heart transplant list.

But she was busted again in August for stealing $500 in toiletries from a CVS drugstore. Prosecutors said the crime was part of McCloud's one-woman shoplifting spree since she was released from jail.

Nassau County Judge Francis Ricigliano ordered McCloud to serve the original 15 month sentence, also for shoplifting, and another year for the new charges, according to her lawyer.

McCloud, who had been going for screenings at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Manhattan to get on its heart transplant list, no longer qualifies for the procedure since Medicaid doesn't cover inmates.

The judge had threatened to toss her back in jail if she didn't quit smoking, a promise he planned to keep when her doctors alerted him that she hadn't kicked the habit.

But when she returned for a court appearance in August, she was arrested on new shoplifting charges, making the smoking deal a moot point.

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