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This episode previously aired in 2022.

A listener note, this episode contains descriptions of violence and references to sexual assault.

It may not be suitable for a younger audience.

It's September 18, 1975, in a jail in northern California.

Patricia Hurst is curled up in bed in a small concrete cell.

The space is no more than six feet wide and nine feet long.

In one corner is a combined toilet and sink, and at the other end are a set of steel bars.

Hurst rolls over, trying to make sense of everything that's happened today.

It was only a few hours ago that FBI agents stormed into her apartment, guns drawn,

and placed her under arrest for robbing a bank.

The encounter with armed law enforcement left Hurst feeling shaken.

But the day took an even more surreal turn when Hurst and the agents arrived at the jailhouse

and found a crowd of reporters waiting for her. Hearst greeted them with a raised fist,

and during her booking, she identified herself as Tanya, her adopted name in the Symbionese Liberation

Army. She even gave her occupation as urban guerrilla. All the radical posturing earned a few

raised eyebrows. Apparently people were expecting that after getting arrested, Hurst would

stop playing the part of political radical. But Hurst's allegiance to the SLA is complicated.

She was, of course, a kidnapping victim, and she had been held captive in a dark closet

...