Patty Hearst joins kidnappers in 1974 bank robbery

In April 1974, 19-year-old Patty Hearst, granddaughter of media tycoon William Randolph Hearst, was kidnapped from her Berkeley, California, residence by the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA).

Two months after her abduction, Hearst released an audio recording stating she no longer wished to be part of her family and had chosen to join the group that kidnapped her. Shortly thereafter, security footage from a San Francisco bank robbery on April 15, 1974, showed Hearst participating in the crime while armed with a gun.

The incident shifted her status from a kidnapping victim to a criminal suspect. Following the robbery, Hearst and the SLA members went into hiding, evading FBI searches for over a year while some group members were killed in police confrontations in Los Angeles.