SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — Gypsy Blanchard has been granted parole and is scheduled to be released in December, the Missouri Department of Corrections confirmed. 

Blanchard, 32, pleaded guilty to murder in 2016 for her role in the killing of her mother, Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard. Gypsy was sentenced to 10 years in prison but has been granted early release. 

The Greene County case attracted a national spotlight and inspired documentaries and an eight-episode mini-series on Hulu. Gypsy’s attorneys say her mother abused her and held her prisoner for years as part of an elaborate fraud scheme. 

They say the abuse included Blanchard’s mother isolating her, forcing her to use a wheelchair and subjecting her to unnecessary medical procedures. The Louisiana native advanced the lies by claiming they were Hurricane Katrina survivors and Gypsy’s medical records had been destroyed in the storm. 

In June of 2015, Gypsy arranged for her online boyfriend Nicholas Godejohn to travel to the family’s home in Springfield to kill her mother. After the murder, Gypsy and Godejohn fled back to his home in Wisconsin where they were arrested days later. 

“Once we started peeling the layers back in, we started getting information based on our Facebook posts, we were able to put everything together and that’s when we were able to figure out that she was, in fact, alive,” said Greene County Sheriff Jim Arnott. “And then in talking with the detectives immediately up there, she was walking in which we all thought was impossible.”

For his role, Godejohn was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison, but Greene County Prosecutor Dan Patterson struck a deal with Gypsy, taking into account the abuse she suffered. 

Gypsy pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to a minimum of 10 years in prison. She will soon be released after serving 85% of her sentence, as required by state law. She was given credit for the time she spent in the Greene Couty Jail before pleading guilty. 

Gypsy’s expected release date is Dec. 28. 

“From my perspective, she was the mastermind behind the murder of her mother,” said Arnott.

He said he believed the 10-year sentence was not appropriate, but does have conflicting emotions when it came to Blanchard’s case.

“If she served the 85%, then it is what it is. She did her time,” said Arnott. “There’s a lot of victims in this deal. And that’s not just Deedee and it’s not Gypsy. It’s the entire community.”