13. Patty and the SLA made radio broadcasts
The details of the first couple of months of Patty’s captivity were horrifying. She later attested that she had been kept inside a dark closet in sweltering conditions, where she was starved, beaten, and raped. Defreeze frequently used sexual techniques to dominate the women in the SLA, who constituted most of its membership. Within two months, Patty and the SLA began making tapes that were used in radio broadcasts all across the country. She said that she was okay but was a bit bruised up. However, the people who had taken her had a medical unit and were tending to all of her wounds.
The initial radio broadcasts, in which Patty acted like she was perfectly fine, indicated that the torture techniques that Defreeze and other SLA members used on her were resulting in Stockholm syndrome. Stockholm syndrome occurs when the victim of a crime, usually a kidnapping, develops sympathy and positive feelings for his or her captor. The person becomes willing to comply with any requests that the captor makes and does not seek his or her own freedom. The terrifying experiences of being kidnapped and tortured are replaced by camaraderie and compassion. What would happen over the next few years would prove to be a classic case of Stockholm syndrome.
