Kidnapped Heiress: The Patty Hearst Story
Media heiress's 1974 capture held the nation spellbound for nearly 2 years
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Watch the full video See the story of Patty Hearst, the newspaper heiress who was kidnapped by terrorists 35 years ago. Dateline has new details. Watch the full hour here. Dateline NBC |
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Patty Hearst changes her name to Tania 1974 report: NBC’s Gale Christian reports on the majority of SLA members being female, crimes they have committed, and Patty Hearst’s decision to join her kidnappers. Dateline NBC |
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Tracking the SLA 1974: NBC's Roger Hagar reports on police suspicions that members of the SLA lived in a Pennsylvania farmhouse. Dateline NBC |
When William Randolph Hearst died in 1951, he left future generations of Hearsts set for life--safely cushioned in the bubble of their birthright. But on the evening of Feb. 4, 1974, that bubble burst.
It was the kind of story old man Hearst would have loved. But few who watched it unfold 35 years ago could have guessed that instead of ransom these kidnappers wanted attention for their cause--even if they weren't quite sure what their cause was.
Brenda Wurzell (eyewitness): I heard her pleading –“Please no, not me,” or words to that effect.
Patty Hearst was a 19-year-old college student, the third of five daughters born to Randolph and Catherine Hearst.
Privately schooled--and groomed for a life of leisure-- Patty nevertheless had a rebellious streak. She frequently clashed with her mother and dismayed both parents when at sixteen she started dating her 23-year-old math tutor, Steven Weed. By the time she was 18, Patty and Steve were living together in Berkley. They planned to be married in June. Then everything changed.
Brenda Wurzell: I heard what were gunshots and I looked out the window and all I saw were the sparks of the gun going off, and I hit the floor.
In a 1997 interview with Dateline, Patty recalled that it all began with an unexpected knock on the door.
Patty Hearst: There was a person standing there. I was in the kitchen. And what I heard was that they had hit a car downstairs and said could they use the phone--and with that people just burst into the apartment.
Forced to the floor, Patty was gagged while her fiancé was beaten with a wine bottle.
Patty Hearst: They started firing machine guns. I mean--I was blindfolded but I could hear the neighbors screaming.
Stuffed into the trunk of a car, Patty Hearst was quickly whisked away.
Patty Hearst: I was only spoken to occasionally when they wanted something. I was questioned by them continuously.
For Randolph Hearst, publisher of the San Francisco Examiner, impromptu press conferences on his front lawn were about to become routine.
Randolph Hearst: We don't know who they are. We don't know when we will hear from them.
A few days later, they did-- when a tape recording was dropped off at a local radio station.
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Patty Hearst, 1974 tape: Mom, Dad--I'm OK. I had a few scrapes and stuff but they've washed them up and they're getting OK.
Patty Hearst: I think it was just a way of confirming that I was alive.
Patty Hearst, 1974 tape: I'm with a combat unit that's armed with automatic weapons and there is no way that I will be released until they let me go--
The next voice on the tape was that of a man who called himself General Field Marshall Cinque.
Field Marshall Cinque: Whatever happens to your daughter will be totally your responsibility and the responsibility of the authorities which you represent.
Most people had never heard of Cinque—or the shadowy group he claimed to lead.
Chancellor: The kidnappers are part of a terrorist group that calls itself the Symbionese Liberation Army.
But Robert Blackburn had. He knew Cinque was an escaped con named Donald Defreeze and he knew his followers were dangerously deranged.
Robert Blackburn: They were just a pathetic, mediocre sort of --after spasm of the best part of the 60's
Blackburn's introduction to SLA had come three months before the Hearst kidnapping.
It was Nov. 6, 1973, when the then-unknown SLA committed its first terrorist act.
Robert Blackburn: It was the end of a long day--I came down and I saw two people leaning against the wall there.
Walking with Blackburn that night outside the Oakland School administration building was his friend, Marcus Foster.
Robert Blackburn: It was here that I heard the shots going off.
Foster was Oakland's popular superintendent of schools. Blackburn, his chief deputy.
Robert Blackburn: I saw two guys crouched like this firing pistols--and I could see the flash.
Marcus Foster was killed instantly. Then a load of buckshot hit Blackburn in the back.
Josh Mankiewicz, Dateline NBC: You've kept this coat all these years?
Robert Blackburn: Oh yeah--24 entrance and exit holes. I still have a lot of shrapnel in me. Liver and kidney damage.
In taking credit, the SLA said Foster had been marked for death because he was a lackey for the ruling class.
Blackburn was targeted because the SLA claimed he was a secret CIA agent.
Robert Blackburn: The whole thing was fantasy thinking. And they thought that by killing a prominent African American educator that would be like striking a match of revolutionary truth.
If that was the intent, it backfired. The Foster killing was roundly deplored, even by those on the left that SLA had hoped to inspire. When two SLA soldiers were arrested for the Foster killing two months later, the SLA decided to seize Patty Hearst in hopes of arranging a prisoner exchange.
Robert Blackburn: All this stuff was just media, you know, dessert.
Josh Mankiewicz: And Marcus Foster somehow got lost in that?
Robert Blackburn: Totally lost in all of that.
The SLA seemed determined that their revolution would be televised. Their communiqués --
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Patty Hearst: I am alive, and it's really depressing though to hear people talking about me like I'm dead.
Afraid Patty might be hurt in a shootout if police found their hiding place, Randolph Hearst wanted to negotiate directly with the kidnappers.
Randolph Hearst: We don't have any desire for revenge on anybody if she is returned unharmed.
Ten days after her kidnapping, he learned how expensive that would be.
The SLA demanded the Hearsts feed California's poor as a pre-condition to negotiating Patty's release. That would cost millions, but Patty's father was willing.
Randolph Hearst: I just want these people to know that I'm going to do everything in my power to set up the kind of program that they are talking about.
Randolph Hearst may have had the will and the wallet--but he didn't have a way to make it all work. The food program he launched a few days later was an expensive disaster.
It would not be the last time the Hearsts were shown that there were limits to what even their money could buy.
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