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Sister Helen Prejean
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Born and raised in Baton Rouge, Helen Prejean has lived and worked in Louisiana all her life. In 1957, she joined the Sisters of St. Joseph of Medaille. Involvement with poor inner-city residents in the St. Thomas Housing Projects in New Orleans in 1981 led her to prison ministry where she counseled death row inmates in the Louisiana State Penitentiary, a ministry she continues today. She has accompanied five men to execution and witnessed their deaths. She also works with murder victims' families and founded Survive, a victims' advocacy group in New Orleans. Sister Helen is the author of Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty in the United States, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. She was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998 and again in 1999.
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