The Political Radicalization of Nancy Ling Perry

Nancy Ling Perry was an integral player in a radical terrorist group that emerged in 1973 and existed until 1975. The Symbionese Liberation Army came to life through a network of university students and prisoners, who initially formed the Black Cultural Association. Nancy was a graduate of the University of California-Berkeley who began to write letters and make visits to prisoners at Vacaville and Soledad Prisons. The SLA was founded by Donald DeFreeze, a prison escapee from Cleveland, Ohio. He took the Symbionese name General Field Marshall Cinque Mtume. Nancy Ling Perry was directly involved in crimes carried out by the SLA. Most notably these were the kidnapping of Patricia Campbell Hearst (February 4, 1974), the assassination of Marcus Foster (November 8, 1973), and the robbery of the Hibernia Bank in April 1974. I wrote extensively about Nancy's drug use, her maternal and paternal family lineage, and the curious way she became politically radicalized via her desire to uplift the plight of African Americans in the United States.