Biography
Patricia Campbell Hearst, granddaughter of newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, was kidnapped from her Berkeley apartment on February 4, 1974 by members of the Symbionese Liberation Army. She was held in a closet for 57 days, sexually abused, and on April 15, 1974 took part — under the SLA name Tania — in the SLA armed robbery of the Hibernia Bank in San Francisco. She was apprehended on September 18, 1975 in San Francisco. She was convicted on March 20, 1976 in U.S. District Court of armed bank robbery and use of a firearm in commission of a felony, and sentenced to 7 years in federal prison. The defense had argued that her actions were the product of coercion and Stockholm-syndrome conditions of her captivity.
President Carter commuted her sentence on January 29, 1979 after she had served 22 months at the Federal Reformatory for Women at Pleasanton, California. President Clinton granted her a full pardon on his last day in office, January 20, 2001. Her case is included in this database with the qualification that her status as a political prisoner is contested - the federal prosecution treated her as a willing SLA participant; the SLA treated her as a captive.
The report says Hearst had been convicted the previous month and was awaiting sentencing. Bailey’s prediction of less than a year in jail is an attorney’s forecast, not a judicial term or completed actual service. This historical report does not replace the later sentence, commutation or pardon evidence.
The Yoshimura defense article contrasts Hearst’s access to lawyers, family embraces and roses with Yoshimura’s SantaRita custody conditions. These are the newspaper’s descriptions of disparate treatment, not proof of identical charges, custody endpoints or personal release.
The sentencing report contrasts Hearst’s seven-year term and actual $1.5 million bail liberty in a private mansion with Yoshimura’s lesser resources and $50,000 bond. These are the newspaper’s descriptions of unequal treatment, not proof that the two women shared charges or actual custody duration.
