Return to Transcripts main page

Breaking News

Sixties Radical Kathy Boudin Denied Parole

Aired August 22, 2001 - 14:26   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: We have a breaking news story from Bedford Hills, New York. The New York Board of Pardons and Paroles has denied parole to '60s radical Kathy Boudin, who has spent the last 20 years in prison for her role in the deadly armed car robbery.

We get more on the story from Garrick Utley: Kathy Boudin denied parole.

Here's Garrick.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARRICK UTLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On an elegant, tree-shaded street in Manhattan, behind the facade of a luxury townhouse, there's a story of that day 31 years ago when a building was blown apart by a bomb being assembled inside by left-wing radicals. Three people died, two survived, including a 27-year-old named Kathy Boudin.

(on camera): She felt at home here on 11th Street. She grew up in the neighborhood. Her father was a successful lawyer, her mother a poet. She graduated from college magna cum laude. She had everything going for her, except.

(voice-over): Except in the late 1960s, Kathy Boudin joined those who went beyond the demonstrating to preach and practice violence in their revolution. After the explosion in the New York townhouse, she went underground for nearly 12 years, often working in menial jobs. Until that day in 1981, when this Brinks truck was ambushed by members of the Black Liberation Army. They took $1.6 million. They left one Brinks guard dead and a second wounded.

Nearby, Kathy Boudin waited in a cab of a U-Hall with a man who was the father of their infant son. The gunman climbed into the back of the van for the getaway. But when police quickly intercepted the truck, the gunman opened fire, killing two officers. For Kathy Boudin, on the left, the years of living dangerously were over.

At the trial, her lawyer father was able to arrange a plea bargain and she was sentenced to 20 years to life for her role in the robbery and killings.

(on camera): Now for the first time she faces the possibility of parole, which raises the question of how justice will be served, whether after 20 years it has been served -- for Kathy Boudin and for the families of those who were killed.

(voice-over): Kathy Boudin is 58 now. She has been a model prisoner, earning a master's degree, working with inmates who have AIDS, and she has received a literary prize for her poetry. Her son is a student at Yale. A woman ready for parole?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Justice, yes. Pardon, no. God bless you all.

UTLEY: Certainly not in the view and anger of the families and police colleagues of the three men killed in the robbery. They left nine children.

DIANE O'GRADY, VICTIM'S WIDOW: We have to live with this, all of us, our entire lives, so why should she get out now? It's not fair.

UTLEY: And as for Kathy Boudin, she offers the lament of so many in prison. Quote: "I have no pride for what I have done, only the wisdom and regret that came too late," unquote. And for that regret, there is no parole.

Garrick Ultley, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WATERS: And the New York Board of Pardons and Paroles agrees, no parole for Kathy Boudin after 20 years in prison, model prisoner or not.

An interesting side note to the story: Another suspect in that same armored car robbery, Susan Rosenberg, spent 16 years in prison on unrelated explosives and weapons charges. She was granted clemency by President Clinton on January 20.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com