Sara Jane Olson Denies SLA Ties
March 1 -- Sara Jane Olson was on her way to teach a citizenship class to recent immigrants in St. Paul, Minn., when she was pulled over by police on June 16, 1999. The doctor's wife and mother of three says she thought it was a routine traffic stop, although she could not imagine what she'd done wrong.
"I couldn't think of anything I had done," she recalls.
The officer told her that her minivan's tinted windows violated state law. But when she glanced in her rear-view mirror, she noticed that a swarm of police cars was arriving on the scene.
In fact, Olson had been stopped because authorities believed she had been involved in a plot to blow up police cars in Los Angeles back in 1975. Law enforcement officials had been looking for her for more than two decades.
Recently, her photo had appeared on national TV in a story on America's Most Wanted about the 25th anniversary of a deadly shootout involving the infamous 1970s terrorist group called the Symbionese Liberation Army. And just months before that, PrimeTime reports, Olson had attempted to negotiate her surrender to the LAPD, but negotiations had broken down.
Olson's arrest leaves only one alleged SLA-fugitive still at large: James Kilgore, who authorities believe was Olson's boyfriend in the mid-1970s.
'Just an Average American Woman'
In a case that is once again making headlines, re-igniting old emotions and raising new questions about illegal activities during the Vietnam War era, Olson now awaits trial on charges of conspiracy to commit murder.
In her first sit-down interview, Olson — formerly Kathleen Soliah — tells ABCNEWS she was never a member of the SLA. Olson says she is "just an average American woman" who was not involved in criminal activity.
"I did not do this thing," she says, referring to the allegation that she helped plant bombs under two police cruisers in Los Angeles in August 1975. The attempted bombing was allegedly linked to the SLA, possibly as revenge for the death of six of the group's members in a 1974 Los Angeles shootout with police.
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