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Unlike most parolees, a former prisoner made an attempt to return to jail so he could receive proper health care.

Ex-convict Frank Morrocco tried to get arrested again after he shoplifted $23 worth of items from a supermarket on November 26. He later turned himself in once hearing there was a federal warrant issued for his arrest for violating his parole. It became the perfect opportunity for him to return to prison so he could receive treatment for his leukemia.

“Actually, I didn’t want to go back to prison, but did I want to die out here? Absolutely not. I want to live,” Morrocco told local reporters.

Morrocco originally served two decades behind bars on drug charges and was released last December.

Unfortunately, a judge denied Morrocco’s request to go back to jail.  Instead the judge ordered him to go to the Roswell Park Cancer Institute to apply for health coverage under the New York Bridge plan. The plan helps New York citizens who have pre-existing conditions.

“I am thankful that it looks like I’m going to get health care coverage,” said Morrocco.

Morrocco is not the first person to use crime in the name of health care.

Last year, Richard James Verone passed a note to a North Carolina bank teller demanding $1 and claimed he had a gun. Since he did not have a job, he was hoping the three year stint in prison would allow him to receive treatment for a lump he had in his chest and two ruptured disks.

“I’m sort of a logical person, and that was my logic, what I came up with,” Verone said. “If it is called manipulation, then out of necessity because I need medical care, then I guess I am manipulating the courts to get medical care.”

Verone was taken to prison and released in July.