Ancient history, back again

The San Francisco Chronicle has an on-line article by Don Thompson of the Associated Press about the Patty Hearst debacle:

A former 1970s radical associated with the group that kidnapped newspaper heiress Patty Hearst finished her prison sentence Tuesday, ending a legal drama that harked back to a violent era of social unrest. Sara Jane Olson, 62, was freed from the Central California Women's Facility shortly after midnight and will be allowed to serve her yearlong parole in Minnesota, the state she adopted during a 24-year flight from justice.
Olson served seven years— half her sentence— after pleading guilty to helping place pipe bombs under Los Angeles Police Department patrol cars and participating in the deadly robbery of a bank in a Sacramento suburb. The crimes took place while she was a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army, a relatively short-lived but violent group that sought to overthrow the government while engaging in killings, robberies and gunbattles with police.
Among the group's victims was 42-year-old Myrna Opsahl, a mother of four who was gunned down during a 1975 robbery of the Crocker National Bank in a Sacramento suburb. "I'm just glad that the former SLA members were finally held accountable for the murder of my mom," Jon Opsahl, who is now living in Southern California, said Tuesday after hearing of Olson's release. "It does finish out this chapter, and I hope it's the last chapter," he said. "I'm glad she's leaving the state."
Olson was released by mistake a year ago after California corrections officials miscalculated her parole date, joining her family for five days before she was rearrested. David Nickerson, one of Olson's attorneys, said Olson and her husband, Dr. Gerald "Fred" Peterson, were trying to make travel arrangements to return to their home in St. Paul, Minnesota, and their three daughters. A bouquet of flowers was left at the couple's home Tuesday morning, but no one was there to receive it.
Not everyone in Minnesota will be happy to see Olson return.
Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty and police protective leagues in Los Angeles and St. Paul wrote Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, urging him to have Olson serve her parole in California. Some Minnesota lawmakers also called for Olson to remain in California. The Los Angeles police union said she should finish her parole in the state where she committed her crimes. "I think today is a slap in the face of California law enforcement and (other) law enforcement... with her release and the governor's abdicating his responsibility to let her leave the state and go back to Minnesota," said Paul Weber, president of the Los Angeles Police Protective League. "The police officers here and around the state are outraged."
Schwarzenegger said he deferred the decision to the corrections department. Department spokeswoman Terry Thornton said parole decisions are intended to give former prisoners the best chance of reintegrating into society and avoiding rearrest. "Being with their family increases the chances that they will succeed on parole," she said.
More than 1,000 California parolees are being supervised in other states. They typically have a week to report to the state in which they will serve their parole. After her release from the prison, 150 miles from San Francisco, Olson and her husband returned to a Madera County parole office to finish paperwork. Neither her lawyers nor corrections officials would say where they went after that.

Rico says this was the hottest news for quite awhile, back in the 70s, when he lived in California.