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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 24, 1975)
Page 6 THE BATTALION WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1975 Driven to insanity Hearst tells of torture Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO — Patricia Hearst swore Tuesday that she was driven to insanity by Symbionese Liberation Army kidnapers who tor tured her mentally and physically. Miss Hearst, in a startling written affidavit, said she did not willingly join the SLA and had returned to the San Francisco area to discover whether her parents still loved her. She said the radical band locked her in a chest for several weeks, then forced her to help rob a bank on threat of instant execution if she dis obeyed. The written testimony did not seek to explain Patty s apparent show of radical ardor since her ar rest — clenched fist salutes, greet ings to radical comrades, a self- description as urban-guerilla on a prison form. Instead, the document said she still may be insane. “Her recollection of everything that transpired from shortly after the bank incident up to the time that she was arrested, has been as though she lived in a fog. . . in a perpetual state of terror, the af fidavit said. Her parents suggested she be hospitalized for mental treatment and be examined by a psychiatrist familiar with prisoner-of-war brainwashing. Miss Hearst, 21, captured by the FBI last Thursday, a year and a half after her kidnaping, appeared in court Monday to seek reduction in her bail. A federal court judge on Friday revoked bail, but said he woidd con sider arguments that she be allowed to go free on bond. Miss Hearst currently is being held in lieu of $5(X),()()() bond. U.S. District Court Judge Oliver J. Carter delayed consideration of that question pending the examina tion by court-appointed psychiat rists and ordered a progress report by next Tuesday. The slender red-haired heiress Firearm charges dropped Associated Press LOS ANGELES — Federal firearms charges against Patricia Hearst and William and Emily Har ris wO J e dismissed here' Tuesday in “the interest of justice, U.S. Atty. William D. Keller said. Keller said he moved to dismiss the charges because they arose from the same incident, a shootout at a suburban Inglewood sporting goods store, as more serious Los Angeles Count) charges. Keller said the dismissal of fed eral charges, accusing the trio of vio lation of the federal Firearms Act tise of an automatic weapon, “elimi nates an unneccessary parallel pro secution. The Harrises face IS felony counts brought by the district attor ney for the shootout, while Miss Hearst has 19 charges against her. They include assault with intent to commit murder, assault with a deadly weapon, kidnaping, robbery and auto theft. Miss Hearst was accused oflaying down a barrage of bullets from an automatic rifle to cover the escape of the Harrises after William was caught allegedly shoplifting in the Inglewood store. The incident occurred the day be fore the Los Angeles shootout that left six other Symbionese Libera tion Arm) members dead. Meanwhile, Acting Dist. Atty. John Howard said Tuesday that he expected the Harrises to appeal’ for arraignment here “during the mid dle of next week. ’ He said there was no indication when Miss Hearst would be arraigned here. fupTnamba Eddie Dominguez 66 Joe Arciniega 74 Greg Price S' IlllW) If you ivant the real thing, not frozen or canned . . We call li “Mexican Food Supreme.” Dallas location-. 3071 Northwest Hwy. sat mute beside her attorneys, her face frozen in the same stony ex pression she has maintained in court since her arrest. Asked by Judge Carter whether she wished to com ment, she shook her head no, but did not speak. Miss Hearst s affidavit detailed only the three-month period after her Feb. 4, 1974 kidnaping. The narrative ended after the April 1974 robbery of the Hibernia Bank in San Francisco during which she was photographed wielding an automa tic rifle. After that, the statement said, her mind is blank. It was in succeeding months that the SLA sent tapes from Miss Hearst announcing she had joined the SLA, calling her family pigs and declaring she was now “Tania,” a revolutionary. “She has attempted to recon struct the events which intervened between the bank episode and her present situation,” the affidavit said, “but the very prospect of going back over so painful and terrible a path has prevented her from even attempting to do so. The statement said she was forced to make early tape recordings while locked in a closet blindfolded, un able to eat or dispose of her bodily wastes. It said SLA member “Cinque,” since identified as convict Donald DeFreeze, forced her to make the first tapes with constant threats of death. He was the only person who spoke to her, she said. She said Cinque and the others tormented her with reports that her family had abandoned her, that the Hearsts would not comply with ran som demands and “it was all right with them if she were put to death. They also told her, she said, that she woidd be shot on sight by law men if she were captured. Shortly before her arrest. Miss Hearst contended, she experienced “lucid intervals’ in which she sus pected her parents still cared for her. She came back to San Francisco to find out their feelings, the state ment contended "... She began to doubt that her parents were involved in any plan for her destruction and wished, by some contrivance, to learn what their feelings toward her were, and whether they would accept her back and give her some of the help which she so desperately needed, the af fidavit said. “For this purpose, she decided to return to San Francisco, to try to find some method of establishing communication with her parents, to discover whether or not she was to really be murdered on sight by of ficers of the law, or if these beliefs were delusions and hallucinations. She said that when FBI agents came to her door Thursday she was still in a “distorted condition and, ‘she thought that she would be in stantly killed. Reportedly, there had been a split among the fugitives, with Miss Hearst gaining support from Wendy Yoshimura, 32, another fugitive being held on weapons charges un related to the SLA. Judge refuses reduction of Patty’s lover’s bail Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO — A U.S. magistrate refused Tuesday to re duce bail for Steven Soliah during a hearing at which Soliah was de scribed as Patricia Hearst s lover. “I lived with him. I finally saw him in jail. They let me kiss him. Miss Hearst was quoted as having told a friend, Patricia Tobin, last Saturday when she visited her at San Mateo County Jail. Asst. U.S. Atty. David Bancroft told Magistrate Owen Woodruff Jr. that authorities had obtained a con versation between Miss Hearst and Miss Tobin, an old friend, in which Miss Hearst asked about Soliah. No explanation was given during the hearing as to how the two had met in jail. It was the first public indication that Miss Hearst had met with either of the males arrested in thecase, Soliah and William Harris. It also was the first indication that the 21-year-old newspaper heiress apparently had a second lover dur ing her months in hiding. In a tape recording shortly after the May 1974 shootout in Los Angeles in which six Symbionese Liberation Army members died, Miss Hearst revealed that she had been in love with one of them, William Wolfe. Bancroft appeared to be reading from a transcript as he described Miss Hearst s conversation with Miss Tobin. He did not say during the hearing how he had obtained the conversation and he refused to tell news reporters afterwards. Soliah s attorney, Steffan Imhoff, said, “1 assume they got it illegal!) It is a violation of state and federal law to transcribe a conversatioi without one or both persons aj. reement. Bancroft said that when Miss Tobin asked Miss Hearst whetlw I Soliah bad rented the outer Mission I district house where she waseap-1 tured last Thursday, Miss Heam I said no, Bancroft said. But then sit I added that she had lived withlii® I and had been allowed to see him in I jail. Soliah, a 27-\ ear-old house- painter being held on $75,000hail, is accused of harboring a fugitive lot alleged!) renting the house where Miss Hearst was captured. drive ALBERTSONS DRUGS & FOODS 301 SO. COLLEGE STORE HOURS MON.-SAT. 8AM-12PM SUN. 9ARM0PM EFFECTIVE DATES - WED., THURS., FRI. f SAT. SEPT. 24, 25, 26, 27