![WENDYYOSHIMURA1976FRESNOphotobyNancyWong](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e5/WENDYYOSHIMURA1976FRESNOphotobyNancyWong.jpg)
Wendy Masako Yoshimura (born January 17, 1943) is an American
still life watercolor
Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to ...
painter. She is known for her involvement with the leftist terrorist group,
Symbionese Liberation Army
The United Federated Forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was a small, American far-left organization active between 1973 and 1975; it claimed to be a vanguard movement. The FBI and American law enforcement considered the SLA to be the ...
, during the mid-1970s. She was born in
Manzanar
Manzanar is the site of one of ten American concentration camps, where more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II from March 1942 to November 1945. Although it had over 10,000 inmates at its peak, it was one ...
, one of numerous World War II-era
internment camp
Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simpl ...
for Japanese Americans, who were forced out of their homes and businesses along the West Coast. She was raised both in Japan and California's
Central Valley.
During her last year of art college, she encountered and became involved in radical politics as a result of meeting activist Willie Brandt.
He founded the Revolutionary Army, another violent leftist organization, in
Berkeley, California
Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...
.
Early life
Yoshimura was born at the
Manzanar Internment Camp for
Japanese Americans
are Americans of Japanese ancestry. Japanese Americans were among the three largest Asian American ethnic communities during the 20th century; but, according to the 2000 census, they have declined in number to constitute the sixth largest Asi ...
where her American-born parents were incarcerated. All the family were American citizens by birth. After the war, the Yoshimura family moved to
Etajima
, also called , ''Nomijima'', ''Nomi Island'', or is an island in Hiroshima Bay located in southwestern Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. The mess with island name originates from the ancient (and possibly legendary) strait at now town .
Geography
Th ...
, a small island off the coast of
Hiroshima. Her father worked for the
Allied Occupation
Occupation commonly refers to:
*Occupation (human activity), or job, one's role in society, often a regular activity performed for payment
*Occupation (protest), political demonstration by holding public or symbolic spaces
*Military occupation, th ...
forces. Yoshimura spoke Japanese as her first language.
The family returned to the US when Yoshimura was 13 years old. Because she did not speak English, Yoshimura was initially placed in the second grade in the
Fresno, California
Fresno () is a major city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley region. It covers about and had a population of 542,107 in 2020, maki ...
school system. She learned English rapidly and later graduated in 1969 from the California College of Arts and Crafts (now
California College of the Arts
California College of the Arts (CCA) is a private art school in San Francisco, California. It was founded in Berkeley, California in 1907 and moved to a historic estate in Oakland, California in 1922. In 1996 it opened a second campus in Sa ...
).
Revolutionary Army
Yoshimura became associated with the Revolutionary Army, a group founded by her boyfriend, Willie Brandt. He used the title in public statements claiming responsibility for violent actions intended to express opposition to the Vietnam War. In 1972, police discovered a weapons and explosives cache in a Berkeley garage which Yoshimura had rented and described it as a "massive bomb factory."
They also found letters taking credit for planned future bombings targeting the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
campus, including the Naval Architecture building. Notes described a specific plan to kidnap or assassinate
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Inte ...
President and former defense secretary
Robert McNamara
Robert Strange McNamara (; June 9, 1916 – July 6, 2009) was an American business executive and the eighth United States Secretary of Defense, serving from 1961 to 1968 under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. He remains the ...
at his winter residence in
Aspen, Colorado
Aspen is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 7,004 at the 2020 United States Census. Aspen is in a remote area of the Rocky Moun ...
.
Brandt and two others were arrested in Berkeley on March 31, 1972, and subsequently convicted.
Yoshimura evaded a police dragnet and fled California.
She lived under an alias in
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...
until 1974. In 1977 she was captured and convicted of unlawful possession of explosives, of a machine gun, and of substances and materials with the intent to make destructive devices and explosives. She was sentenced to a one-to-fifteen years in prison. She was released on parole in September 1980.
Symbionese Liberation Army
Also in 1974, married couple
Bill
Bill(s) may refer to:
Common meanings
* Banknote, paper cash (especially in the United States)
* Bill (law), a proposed law put before a legislature
* Invoice, commercial document issued by a seller to a buyer
* Bill, a bird or animal's beak
Plac ...
and
Emily Harris
Emily Harris (born February 11, 1947 as Emily Montague Schwartz) was, along with her husband William Harris (1945–), a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), an American left-wing terrorist group involved in murder, kidnapping, and ...
, with kidnapping victim-turned fugitive
Patty Hearst, relocated to rural
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
. The Harrises were surviving founding members of the
Berkeley terrorist group known as the
Symbionese Liberation Army
The United Federated Forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was a small, American far-left organization active between 1973 and 1975; it claimed to be a vanguard movement. The FBI and American law enforcement considered the SLA to be the ...
. Six of their members had died in a May 1974 shootout with
Los Angeles police at a house in Los Angeles. Sports writer and political activist Jack Scott had helped the high-profile fugitives make their way east. He arranged for Yoshimura to join them and handle shopping and other public transactions.
After two months with the group, Yoshimura left and returned alone to California, taking up residence in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
. Hearst and the Harrises found their own way back into the state and regrouped in
Sacramento
)
, image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg
, mapsize = 250x200px
, map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...
. When the FBI found Yoshimura's thumbprint in the SLA's rural hideout, newspaper headlines tied her to the group. She fled San Francisco and reunited with the SLA members in Sacramento.
While in Sacramento with associates from the San Francisco Bay Area, some of the fugitives planned and carried out an armed robbery of
Crocker National Bank
Crocker National Bank was a United States bank headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was acquired by and merged into Wells Fargo Bank in 1986.
History
The bank traces its history to the Woolworth National Bank in San Francisco. Charles ...
in
Carmichael, California
Carmichael is a census-designated place (CDP) in Sacramento County, California, Sacramento County, California, United States. It is a suburb in the Sacramento metropolitan area, Greater Sacramento metropolitan area. The population was 79,793 at th ...
. Bank customer Myrna Opsahl was shot and killed. Hearst's account in ''Every Secret Thing'' states that she and Yoshimura opposed the action and were assigned to "switch cars" far from the scene. After the robbery, the group abandoned Sacramento and fled individually to San Francisco.
Arrest and conviction
![Press conference 2 with Lloyd Wake and Wendy Yoshimura,](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Press_conference_2_with_Lloyd_Wake_and_Wendy_Yoshimura%2C.jpg)
On September 18, 1975, Yoshimura was arrested with Hearst in a second-floor
apartment at 625 Morse Street by
FBI
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...
Special Agent Tom Padden and
San Francisco Police Department Inspector Tim Casey.
Padden and Casey failed to read Hearst and Yoshimura their
Miranda rights
In the United States, the ''Miranda'' warning is a type of notification customarily given by police to criminal suspects in police custody (or in a custodial interrogation) advising them of their right to silence and, in effect, protection ...
, and did not obtain a search warrant until twenty-six hours later. Weapons evidence, including a handgun in Yoshimura's purse and a shotgun in the bedroom, was suppressed because of this oversight.
During Yoshimura's trial,
Japanese Americans
are Americans of Japanese ancestry. Japanese Americans were among the three largest Asian American ethnic communities during the 20th century; but, according to the 2000 census, they have declined in number to constitute the sixth largest Asi ...
who empathized with her family's experience during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
gave $150,000 to aid her legal defense conducted by the
Asian Law Caucus
Founded in 1972, the Asian Law Caucus (ALC) is the U.S.'s first legal aid and civil rights organization serving the low-income Asian Pacific American communities. The ALC focuses housing rights, immigration and immigrant rights, labor and empl ...
, and led by Garrick Lew. They did this through the Wendy Yoshimura Fair Trial Committee.
Ultimately, Yoshimura was convicted on explosives and weapons charges and sent to state prison for six months; she was paroled in 1980.
Grand jury investigation
In 1991 Yoshimura was granted limited immunity to testify during a grand jury investigation into the 1975 armed bank robbery by the SLA in Carmichael, California in which Myrna Opsahl, 42-year-old mother of four, was killed.
One SLA member,
Michael Bortin
The United Federated Forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was a small, American far-left organization active between 1973 and 1975; it claimed to be a vanguard movement. The FBI and American law enforcement considered the SLA to be the ...
, had pleaded guilty to the robbery. No indictments resulted at the time.
In 2002 five former SLA members and associates were arrested, and four of them pleaded guilty to charges related to the homicide.
Present day
Yoshimura is an artist and resides in north
Oakland, California
Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...
. She teaches water color painting at her studio and at a San Francisco community center. Her still-life watercolors are often displayed in the Bay Area.
In media
*''
American Woman
"American Woman" is a song by Canadian rock band the Guess Who, released January 1970, from the album of the same name. It was later released in March 1970 as a single backed with "No Sugar Tonight", and it reached number one for three weeks ...
'' (2003) by
Susan Choi is a novel related to Yoshimura's life during that period of involvement with Hearst and the SLA. Characters are given other names and circumstances changed. It was a finalist for the
Pulitzer Prize.
*It was adapted as a 2019
film by the same name, written and directed by Canadian filmmaker
Semi Chellas.
Hong Chau
Hong Chau (born June 25, 1979) is an American actress who gained recognition for her supporting role in the 2017 film '' Downsizing'', in which she played the character Ngoc Lan Tran. For her performance, she was nominated for several supporting ...
plays the activist Jenny.
*''Wendy... Uh... What's Her Name'' is a 2006 documentary by Curtis Choy.
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yoshimura, Wendy
1943 births
Living people
American prisoners and detainees
Japanese-American civil rights activists
Japanese-American internees
Painters from California
Prisoners and detainees of California
American artists of Japanese descent
Symbionese Liberation Army
American women painters
Criminals of the San Francisco Bay Area
People from Inyo County, California
Activists from California
21st-century American women artists
20th-century American women