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Kathy Boudin (May 19, 1943 – May 1, 2022) was an American leftist activist. She was a member of the radical left militant organization Weather Underground who was convicted of felony murder for her role in the 1981 Brink's robbery. The robbery resulted in the killing of two Nyack, New York, police officers and one security guard, and serious injury to another security guard. Boudin was released from prison on parole in 2003 and became an adjunct professor at Columbia University.

Early life and family

Kathy Boudin was born on May 19, 1943, into a family with a long left-wing history. She was raised in Greenwich Village, New York City. Her family was Jewish. Her great-uncle was Louis B. Boudin, a Marxist theorist. Her father, attorney Leonard Boudin, had represented controversial clients such as Judith Coplon, the Cuban government, and Paul Robeson. A National Lawyers Guild attorney, Leonard Boudin was the law partner of Victor Rabinowitz, himself counsel to numerous left-wing organizations. Kathy Boudin attended Bryn Mawr College and was valedictorian of the class of 1965.

Boudin fell in love with David Gilbert in the 1970s and gave birth to their son Chesa in 1980. When her son was 14 months old she was arrested and subsequently incarcerated for murder and bank robbery. Her son was raised by former Weatherman leaders Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.

1981 Brink's robbery

In the 1960s and 1970s, Boudin became heavily involved with the Weather Underground. In 1981, Boudin and several former members of the Weather Underground and the Black Liberation Army robbed a Brink's armored car at the Nanuet Mall, in Nanuet, New York. Boudin was the driver of the getaway vehicle and also acted as a decoy. The robbery severely wounded guard Joseph Trombino; killed his partner, Peter Paige; killed police officers Waverly Brown and Edward O'Grady; and injured two other police officers.

Guilty plea and incarceration

Boudin eventually pleaded guilty to felony murder and robbery in exchange for a sentence of 20 years to life in prison.

While incarcerated, Boudin published articles in the Harvard Educational Review ("Participatory Literacy Education Behind Bars: AIDS Opens the Door," Summer 1993, 63 (2)), in Breaking the Rules: Women in Prison and Feminist Therapy by Judy Harden and Marcia Hill ("Lessons from a Mother's Program in Prison: A Psychosocial Approach Supports Women and Their Children," published simultaneously in Women & Therapy, 21), and in Breaking the Walls of Silence: AIDS and Women in a New York State Maximum-Security Prison.

She co-authored The Foster Care Handbook for Incarcerated Parents published by Bedford Hills in 1993. She also co-edited Parenting from inside/out: Voices of mothers in prison, jointly published by correctional institutions and the Osborne Foundation.

Boudin also wrote and published poetry while incarcerated, publishing in books and journals including the PEN Center Prize Anthology Doing Time, Concrete Garden, and Aliens at the Border. She won an International PEN prize for her poetry in 1999.

Boudin and Roslyn D. Smith contributed the piece "Alive Behind the Labels: Women in Prison" to the 2003 anthology Sisterhood Is Forever: The Women's Anthology for a New Millennium, edited by Robin Morgan.

Boudin was granted parole on August 20, 2003, in her third parole hearing. She was released from Bedford Hills Correctional Facility on September 17, 2003.
Life after prison

After her release from prison, Boudin accepted a job in the HIV/AIDS Clinic at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, meeting the work provisions of parole that required active job prospects.

In May 2004, after her parole, Boudin published in the Fellowship of Reconciliation's publication Fellowship. Subsequently, she received an Ed. D. from Columbia University Teachers College. In addition to her work at St. Luke's-Roosevelt, Boudin has worked as a consultant to the Osborne Association in the development of a Longtermers Responsibility Project taking place in the New York State Correctional Facilities, utilizing a restorative practice approach. She has also consulted for Vermont Corrections and the Women's Prison Association and supervises social workers.

Columbia University

Boudin was named an adjunct professor at the Columbia University School of Social Work, where she is now the co-director and co-founder of the Center for Justice at Columbia University. Her appointment was controversial due to her guilty plea to a felony murder charge and her past participation in a group which carried out terrorist attacks in the United States. However, it is also noted that she atoned for her crime and successfully rehabilitated herself. Columbia School of Social Work Associate Dean Marianne Yoshioka, who hired Boudin for the adjunct-professor post in 2008, was quoted as saying that Boudin has been "an excellent teacher who gets incredible evaluations from her students each year." In 2013, she was Sheinberg Scholar-in-Residence at New York University School of Law. The School of Law maintains a video of her lecture.

In popular culture

Boudin was a model for the title role in David Mamet's play The Anarchist (2012). She also was a model for Willy Holtzman's Off-Broadway play Something You Did (2008).

Death

On May 1, 2022, Boudin died in New York City at the age of 78, a day after returning from a visit to San Francisco. According to her son Chesa Boudin, who was serving as District Attorney of San Francisco, Boudin had been battling cancer for seven years.


(https://en.wikipedia.org)

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Peter Dennis Blandford "Pete" Townshend (pronounced /ˈtaʊnzənd/; born 19 May 1945) is an English rock guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and author, known principally as the guitarist and songwriter for The Who, as well as for his own solo career. His career with The Who spans more than forty years, during which time the band grew to be considered one of the most influential bands of the rock era,  and, according to Eddie Vedder, "possibly the greatest live band ever."

Townshend is the primary songwriter for the Who, having written well over one hundred songs for the band's eleven studio albums, including concept albums, and the rock operas Tommy and Quadrophenia and popular rock and roll radio staples including Who's Next, plus dozens more that appeared as non-album singles, bonus tracks on reissues, and tracks on rare compilations such as Odds and Sods. He has also written over one hundred songs that have appeared on his solo albums and various compilations by other performers, as well as radio jingles, and television theme songs. Although known primarily as a guitarist, he is also an accomplished singer, keyboardist, and also plays other instruments, such as banjo, accordion, synthesizer, piano, bass guitar and drums, on his own solo albums, several Who albums, and as a guest contributor to a wide array of other artist's recordings. Peter Townshend has never had formal lessons in any of the instruments he plays.

Townshend has also been a contributor and author of newspaper and magazine articles, book reviews, essays, books, and scripts, as well as collaborating as a lyricist (and composer) for many other musical acts. Townshend was ranked #3 in Dave Marsh's list of Best Guitarists in The New Book of Rock Lists and #50 in Rolling Stone magazine's 2003 list: 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.


(https://en.wikipedia.org)

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Pentagon Bombing, 1972

On May 19, 1972, Ho Chi Minh’s birthday, The Weather Underground placed a bomb in the women’s bathroom in the Air Force wing of The Pentagon. The damage caused flooding that destroyed computer tapes holding classified information. Other radical groups worldwide applauded the bombing, illustrated by German youths protesting against American military systems in Frankfurt.  This was "in retaliation for the U.S. bombing raid in Hanoi." [NYT, 5/19/72]


(https://en.wikipedia.org)

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The Blind Ass said:

Amazing. The more time flows/passes, the more impressed I am that the 60s psychedelic counterculture(s) ever took place at all.  All in all, its got some iffy bits to it, but I’m still glad that human beings did what they did then for the most part.

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Yeah, nobody's perfect. These situations make people crazy. But thank god they tried to change it.