The kidnapping of Patricia Hearst, the granddaughter of publisher William Randolph Hearst, was one of the biggest news stories of the 1970s.
“….Patricia Hearst became a media celebrity after being kidnapped by a group of revolutionaries calling themselves the Symbionese Liberation Army. The kidnap victim transformed into a seemingly willing accomplice; over the months of her kidnapping, she participated in crimes, claimed allegiance to the S.L.A., and defended her captors as valiant heroes.
….Her parents thought that she had been brainwashed; experts suggested that she was a victim of the Stockholm Syndrome, mistakenly identifying with her captors in an effort at self-preservation.
….In a sensational trial in March 1976, Patty Hearst, represented by well-known defense attorney F. Lee Bailey, was found guilty of armed bank robbery and sentenced to seven years in prison. She served 22 months before having her sentence commuted by President Jimmy Carter.”
— “The Rise and Fall of the Symbionese Liberation Army”
Webpage for the film, “Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst”
PBS American Experience, 2005
See Also:
Video: “Kidnapped Heiress: The Patty Hearst Story”
Dateline NBC, 2009
The front page of the Albuquerque Journal reported that Patty Hearst was convicted of armed robbery on March 20, 1976:
About two years before the trial, on February 12, 1974, The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite broadcast this story about the Hearst kidnapping:
Page one from the Fremont California newspaper, The Sunday Argus:
Last month (February 2015) Patty Hearst was in the news for a much different reason:
“Famed and infamous heiress Patty Hearst was back in the news Monday after a dog she co-owns won its group at the Westminster Kennel Club show.
A shih tzu called Rocket was picked as the top toy dog at Madison Square Garden.
….’People move on,’ she said, smiling at Rocket. ‘I guess people somehow imagine you don’t evolve in your life. I have grown daughters and grand-daughters and other things that normal people have.'”
“Patty Hearst makes headlines again — thanks to her dog”
Associated Press / CBS, February 17, 2015
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