Biography
Kathleen Ann Soliah, who lived under the name Sara Jane Olson for more than two decades, was a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army who participated in the August 1975 attempted bombing of two Los Angeles Police Department squad cars in retaliation for the May 17, 1974 LAPD-FBI raid that killed six SLA members. She fled California in 1975 and lived as Sara Jane Olson in Saint Paul, Minnesota for 24 years — marrying a doctor, raising three daughters, becoming active in her local Methodist church, and acting in community theatre. She was arrested in Saint Paul on June 16, 1999.
In October 2001 she pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted murder for the LAPD car-bomb action and was sentenced to two consecutive 10-years-to-life terms; the Board of Prison Terms set her sentence at 14 years. She also pleaded guilty in November 2002 to second-degree murder for the April 21, 1975 SLA bank robbery in Carmichael, California in which a customer named Myrna Opsahl was killed; she was sentenced to an additional 6 years to run concurrently. She was released on parole on March 17, 2009.
The FBI report distinguishes Olson’s October 31, 2001 plea in the Los Angeles car-bomb case from her November 7, 2002 plea in the Opsahl bank-robbery case. It dates the latter sentencing to February 14, 2003.
