TAX DAY Patty (the15th)

The Claiming of Patty Hearst

It was 9:40 A.M. on the fifteenth day of April in 1974, tax day. Customers were going to the Hibernia Bank in the Sunset district of San Francisco to make their usual transactions. Suddenly four white women and a black man walked in and yelled, "It's a hold-up! Down on the floor! On your faces, you motherfuckers!"

In under four minutes, they robbed the bank of over $10,000, wounded two bystanders, and fled in a getaway car.

When reviewing the videotape afterward, the police were in for a surprise. Among the hold-up gang they saw the face of a nineteen-year-old woman who'd been missing for over two months: Patricia Campbell Hearst, granddaughter of legendary newspaper publisher, William Randolf Hearst. Not only that, she was brandishing a carbine and acting excited, as if she were one of them. It was to be one of the most bizarre events of that period, the truth of whether she was 'down' or not is still under debate.