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In flat tones and almost metronomic cadences, he explained to the jury in minute detail how, among other things, they would be shown film of the bank robbery and hear witnesses who saw a gun-toting girl announce, "This is Tania Hearst." Browning also cited Patty's machine-gunning support of S.L.A. comrades four weeks later at a Los Angeles sporting goods store and a book manuscript prepared by Patty and Emily and William Harris, the only S.L.A. survivors, in which Patty allegedly wrote that she "began to feel sympathy" for the S.L.A. cause and eventually asked to join the group.
Then it was Bailey's turn. Wearing a charcoal gray suit, the banty, 5 ft. 7¾ in. ex-Marine flyer walked to the lectern, folded his arms, leaned toward the jury and, without glancing at his notes, delivered a calm, 30-minute summary of his case. There would be no denial that Patty was in the bank, he said, but he urged the jury to note that "perhaps for the first time in the history of bank robbery, a robber was directed to identify herself in the midst of the act." Patty, his argument ran, was a normal, marriage-bound college coed of 19 when she was kidnaped; her fragile teen-age will was broken during her first six to nine weeks with the S.L.A., during which she was kept in a closet and sexually abused by S.L.A.
Leader Donald ("Cinque") De Freeze.
Her captors were "crazy people" who were "decidedly serious that they could overthrow the United States of America through terrorist tactics." After she was frightened into submission, she also became convinced that the FBI would kill her if she tried to escape—a conviction, Bailey went on, that was only hardened by then Attorney General William Saxbe's remark that Patty should be regarded as "nothing but a common criminal." At the moment she was captured by FBI agents last September, Bailey continued, "her terror mounted to the point which is probably the highest a human being can stand, and she became incontinent." As they listened to Bailey's presentation, Patty's mother Catherine and sister Vicki, sitting next to Randolph Hearst in the first spectator bench, wept quietly.
The prosecution then began to present its film and witnesses. One of them was Bank Guard Edward Shea, 68, who testified that one of the women in the robbery pointed a gun at him and said, "The first person who puts up his head, I'll blow his motherf—ing head off." Then in the crossexamination, Bailey flashed a bit of the style that is his trademark. He asked the guard who it was who had threatened him.
Shea: Nobody threatened me.
Bailey: I thought someone said they were going to blow your motherf—ing head off.
Shea: I thought she said it to the general public.
Bailey asked that the film of the robbery be run so Shea could identify the woman who had snarled the threat. First, Shea pointed to Nancy Ling Perry; then, obviously confused, he pointed to the third girl in the robbery, Camilla Hall. When Shea mumbled a response to a later question, Bailey asked him what he had said.
Shea: Your voice is too low.
Bailey: Do you have a hearing problem?
Shea: Yes.
Bailey: Did you have a hearing problem the day of the robbery?
Shea: Yes.