MONROE, Wash. - For the first time ever, a Washington State prison inmate has received a life-saving transplant while serving time, and taxpayers footed the bill.

The 55-year old inmate is serving time at the Monroe Correctional facility on a series of drug charges. The state won't release his name. He had been on a liver transplant wait list for more than two years.

On March 25th, he received a donated liver during an operation at the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle.

The Department of Corrections says the operation cost somewhere between 250,000 and 500,000 dollars. All of it was paid for by Washington taxpayers through the prison system's 80 million dollar health car budget.

KING

A Monroe prison inmate still serving time received a life-saving liver transplant March 25th.

The Department of Corrections says the inmate passed the necessary physical and mental screening needed to get on the transplant list, but it's unclear if his illegal drug problems were a factor in that process. Many transplant organizations will not put people on the wait list if they have active alcohol or substance abuse problems.

Nationwide, more than 17-thousand people are waiting for a new liver.  It's the second most commonly transplanted major organ after the kidney.