2. Patty Hearst was convicted of armed robbery and use of firearms to commit a felony
Patty, the dethroned princess of the Hearst empire, was sentenced to 35 years of prison. At the beginning of her prison term, her lung collapsed in what was only the beginning of a long string of medical problems that ultimately prevented her from testifying against the Harris’s at their trial. She was held in solitary confinement, as she was deemed a security threat. When she became eligible for bail, her father immediately put up the money and hired a dozen bodyguards to protect her. Her parents tried to take her case to the Supreme Court, but their requests were denied.
Patty’s sentence became a cause that high-profile judges and politicians took up. The attorney general of California, Evelle Younger, said that even though she didn’t have a brainwashing defense, Patty’s case should be reviewed because it all began with her kidnapping. Senator Leo Ryan, who would die a few weeks later in the massacre at Jonestown, Guyana, collected signatures for Patty to be released. After the Jonestown massacre, actor John Wayne publicly remarked on the idea that a fanatical preacher could brainwash 900 people into committing suicide, but the SLA couldn’t brainwash a teenage girl that they had kidnapped. Patty’s bail was revoked in May of 1978, and no security precautions were taken at the prison until, on the day of the Harris’s’ hearing, a dead rat was found on her bunk.
