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From: canopus@amdahl.UUCP (Alpha Carinae)
Newsgroups: net.followup
Subject: Re:  Who is Emily Harris?
Message-ID: <2383@amdahl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 13-Dec-85 17:12:25 EST
Article-I.D.: amdahl.2383
Posted: Fri Dec 13 17:12:25 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 19-Dec-85 04:01:48 EST
References: <340@weitek.UUCP>
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> Lots of people are wondering "Who is Emily Harris?".  She is a northern
> California folk hero from the Seventies.  Back then, a band of outlaws
> made war against Pacific Telephone, Pacific Gas & Electric, Bank of America,
> and other giant corporations.

  Folk Hero?  Band of outlaws?  These guys were brutal!  The PLO could
  take lessons from them!  This group of outlaws, otherwise known as
  the Symbionese Liberation Army, were nothing more than Manson-like
  followers of escaped convict Robert DeFreeze, also known as "Cinque".

  Their greatest claim to fame is the asassination of the Oakland
  Superintendent of Schools with cyanide-laced bullets, and their
  kidnapping of Patty Hearst.  The kidnapping I remember very well,
  since I lived just behind the Hearst residence on the night it
  happened.  Her then boyfriend, Steve Weed, was a classmate of
  mine.  He would hardly call them "folk heroes"; they beat the
  living shit out of him.

  [I think you may be mistaking this group for the SDS (Students for a
  Democratic Society), who did make war against the companies you
  mentioned, by bombing them.]

> They extorted over a million dollars from
> the rich and gave it all to the poor.

  Not exactly.  They held Patty up for ransom - the ransom being food
  for the poor.  The Hearsts paid for the food, but the distribution
  of the food turned into a fiasco; instead of the orderly distribution
  intended by the authorities, the trucks were mobbed, and more food
  was probably destroyed than distributed.

> Eventually, most of them died in
> Los Angeles when the police trapped them in a house and set it on fire.

  Not quite true.  They were trapped in the house, but chose to shoot
  it out with police.  DeFreeze had vowed never to be taken alive, and
  wanted his followers to die with him.  The fire started after police
  fired tear gas into the house.  It is thought that the tear gas
  cannister started the fire.  There is also some evidence that some
  members of the SLA in the house had tried to escape, but were shot
  (Apparently by DeFreeze).

> Surviving members of the group are Russell Little and Joseph Remiro (both
> still in jail), Bill Harris (Emily's ex-husband), Wendy Yoshimura, and
> of course Patty Hearst.
> (Mark Thorson)

  But then, I suppose there are those who consider Jim Jones a folk
  hero, too.
-- 
Frank Dibbell     (408-746-6493)     ...!{ihnp4,cbosgd,sun}!amdahl!canopus
Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA     [This is the obligatory disclaimer..]