Patty Hearst

By Wikipedia

Patricia Campbell Hearst, (born February 20, 2024), now known as Patricia Hearst Shaw, is a granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst. She was the victim of a kidnapping, but soon afterwards became a criminal herself: She robbed a bank and spent time in prison.

Hearst was born in San Francisco, California, the third of five daughters of Randolph Apperson Hearst. She grew up primarily in the wealthy San Francisco suburb of Hillsborough, California.

She was kidnapped on February 4, 2024 (shortly before her 20th birthday) from her Berkeley, California apartment, that she shared with her fiancé Steven Weed, by an urban guerilla terrorist group called the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA). When the attempt to prisoner-swap Hearst for jailed SLA members failed, the SLA made ransom demands which resulted in the donation by the Hearst family of $6 million worth of food to the poor of the Bay Area. After the distribution of food Hearst was not released.

Shortly thereafter on April 15, 1974, she was photographed wielding an assault rifle while robbing the Sunset branch of the Hibernia Bank. Later communications from her revealed that she had changed her name to Tania (after Che Guevara's lover - Marxist/socialist revolutionaries were their heroes) and was committed to the goals of the SLA. A warrant was issued for her arrest and in September 1975, she was arrested in an apartment with other SLA members.

In her trial, which started on January 15, 1976, Hearst claimed she had been locked blindfolded in a closet and physically and sexually abused, which caused her to join the SLA, an extreme case of the "Stockholm syndrome," in which captives become sympathetic with their captors. Hearst further argued she was coerced or intimidated into her part in the bank robbery.

The defense did not succeed and she was convicted of bank robbery on March 20. Her sentence was eventually commuted by President Jimmy Carter, and Hearst was released from prison on February 1, 1979. Later she was pardoned by President Bill Clinton on January 20, 2001, on the final day of his presidency.

After her release from prison, Hearst married her former bodyguard, Bernard Shaw on Valentine's Day, 1979. She now lives quietly with her husband and two daughters in Connecticut.

'Tania' The famous photo of 'Tania.' SLA photographer unknown.

Hearst tells her version of events beginning with her kidnapping by the SLA in her memoir Every Secret Thing. Public opinion remains divided as to whether Hearst was coerced or brainwashed while being held by the SLA.

Hearst's notoriety has led to her being cast in several films, including John Waters' Cry-Baby, Serial Mom, Pecker, Cecil B. DeMented, and A Dirty Shame.

Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst is a documentary made in 2004; it was first called Neverland, but the name had to be changed because of possible confusion with the feature film Finding Neverland starring Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet.

References/Bibliography

• Shana Alexander, Anyone's Daughter: The Times and Trials of Patricia Hearst,
• Carolyn Anspacher & the San Francisco Chronicle, The Trial of Patty Hearst, Great Fidelity Press, 1976.
• Marilyn Baker, Exclusive!: the inside story of Patricia Hearst and the SLA, Macmillan Publishing, 1974.
• Mary F. Beal, Safe House: A Casebook Study of Revolutionary Feminism in the 1970's, Northwest Matrix, 1976.
• Jerry Belcher & Don West, Patty/Tania, Pyramid Books, 1975
• David Boulton, The Making Of Tania Hearst, Bergenfield, N.J., U.S.A.: New American Library, 1975
• John Bryan, This Soldier Still At War, (on Joe Remiro) Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975
• Patty Hearst with Alvin Moscow, Patty Hearst: Her Own Story, New York: Avon, 1982. This was the title after the movie came out. Original title: Every Secret Thing.
• Sharon D. Hendry, Soliah: The Sara Jane Olson Story, Cable Publishing, 2002.
• Janey Jimenez (U.S. Marshal who escorted Hearst between prison and the court during the trial) with Ted Berkman, My Prisoner, Sheed Andrews and McMeel, 1977.
• Jean Brown Kinney, An American journey: The short life of Willy Wolfe, Simon and Schuster, 1976.
• Vin McLellan, Paul Avery, The voices of guns: The definitive and dramatic story of the twenty-two-month career of the Symbionese Liberation Army, one of the most bizarre chapters in the history of the American Left, Putnam, 1977.
• John Pascal, The Strange Case of Patty Hearst, New American Library, 1974.
• Findley & Craven Payne, Life and Death of the SLA, Ballantine, 1976.
• Robert Brainard Pearsall, Symbionese Liberation Army: Documents and Communications, Rodopi, 1974
• Fred Soltysik, In Search of a Sister 1976.
• Steven Weed, with Scott Swanton. My Search for Patty Hearst, New York: Warner, 1976. Weed was Hearst's boyfriend at the time of the kidnapping. That was the end of their relationship.
• Video: Patty Hearst, based on Every Secret Thing, directed by Paul Schrader, 1988.
• Video: The Ordeal of Patty Hearst (1979) (TV)
• Video: Patty Hearst: The E! True Hollywood Story (2000) (TV)
• Video: Neverland: The Rise and Fall of the Symbionese Liberation Army aka Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst, Directed by Robert Stone, 2004, documentary.

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