Arthur Hailey - Evening News

Lab technicians searching the vault found traces of semen. Following a week of questioning, one of the women, while denying having had sex, said that during one night while others were asleep she helped Olsson to masturbate. Investigators, while skeptical about the no-sex statement, dropped the matter.

During questioning by doctors the freed hostages referred to police as "the enemy” and believed it was the criminals to whom they owed their lives. Elisabeth accused a doctor of attempting to "brainwash away” her regard for Olsson and Olaffsson.

In 1974, nearly a year after the bank drama, Birgitta visited Olsson in jail, conversing with him for half an hour.

Investigating doctors eventually declared the hostages' reaction typical of anyone caught in "survival situations.”They quoted Anna Freud who described such reactions as "identification with the aggressor.”But it took the Swedish bank drama to create a permanent, memorable name.— the Stockholm syndrome.

* * *

"Hey, that's neat, Mom,” Nicky called out.

”I never knew all that, Jessie,” Angus added.

Nicky asked, "Got any more good stuff?”

Jessica was pleased.”A little.”

Once more she drew on her memories of the Britisher, Brigadier Wade.”I have two pieces of advice for you,” he once told his anti-terrorist class.”First, if you're a captive and a hostage: Beware the Stockholm syndrome! Second, when dealing with terrorists keep in mind that 'Love your enemies' is vapid nonsense. At the other extreme, don't squander time and effort hating terrorists, because hate is a wasteful, draining emotion. Just never for a moment trust them, or like them, and never stop thinking of them as the enemy.”

Jessica repeated the Wade advice for Nicky and Angus. She went on to describe airplane hijackings where people who had been seized and abused developed friendly feelings for their attackers. This proved true with the infamous TWA flight 847 in 1985 when some passengers expressed sympathy for the Shiite hijackers and expounded their captors' propagandist views.

More recently, Jessica explained, a released hostage from the Middle East—a pathetic figure, clearly another victim of the Stockholm syndrome—even delivered a message from his jailers to the Pope and the U.S. President, gaining much publicity while he did. The nature of the message was not disclosed, though unofficially it was called banal and pointless.

Of even greater concern to those who understood the Stockholm syndrome was the case of kidnap victim Patricia Hearst. Unfortunately for Hearst, who was arrested in 1975 and tried the following year for alleged crimes while dominated by her brutish captors, the events in Stockholm were not sufficiently known to allow either sympathy or justice. Speaking at one of the Wade anti-terrorist sessions, an American lawyer declared, "In legal and intellectual values the Patty Hearst trial must be equated with the Salem witchcraft trials of 1692.” He added, "Knowing what we do now, and remembering that the wrong done was recognized by President Carter who commuted her prison sentence, it will be a dark day of shame for our country if Patricia Hearst is allowed to die unpardoned.”

"So what you're saying, Jessie,” Angus said, "is not to be taken in by Vicente's seeming easy. He's still an enemy.”

"If he weren't,” Jessica pointed out, "we could just walk out of here while he's guarding us.”

“Which we know we can't.” Angus directed his voice to the middle cell.”Have you got that, Nicky? Your mom's right and you and I were wrong.”

Nicky nodded glumly, without speaking. One of the sadnesses of this incarceration, Jessica thought, was that Nicky was being faced—earlier than would have happened normally —with some harsh realities of human infamy.

* * *

As always in Peru, the developing news concerning the Sloane family kidnapping traveled over the longest distances and to the country's remotest places by radio.

The first news of the linkage of Peru and Sendero Luminoso to the kidnapping was reported on Saturday, the day following the CBA National Evening News broadcast in which the exclusive material assembled by the network's special task force was revealed. While the kidnapping had been reported earlier by Perru's media in a minor way, the local involvement made it instant major news. here, too, radio was the means of widest, dissemination.

Similarly, on the Tuesday morning following Monday's news breakthrough by the Baltimore Star, radio delivered to the Andes mountain city of Ayacucho and the Selva hamlet Nueva Esperanza the first report of Theodore Elliott's rejection of the kidnappers' demands and his low opinion of Sendero Luminoso.

In Ayacucho the radio report was heard by Sendero leaders and in Nueva Esperanza by the terrorist Ulises Rodriguez, alias Miguel'

Soon after, a telephone conversation took place between Miguel and a Sendero leader in Ayacucho, though neither disclosed his name while talking. Both were aware that the telephone connection was poor by modern standards and that the line passed through other locations where anyone could be listening, including the army or police. Thus they talked in generalities and veiled references, at which many in Peru were practiced, though to both men the meaning was understood.

This was: Something must be done immediately to prove to the American TV network, CBA, that they were dealing with neither fools nor weaklings. Killing one of the hostages and leaving the body to be found in Lima was a possibility. Miguel, while agreeing that would be effective, suggested for the moment keeping all three hostages alive, preserving them like capital. Instead of killing, he advised another course of action which—remembering something he had learned while at Hackensack—he believed would be devastating psychologically to those at the other end of the equation in New York.

This was promptly agreed to and, since physical transportation would be needed, a car or truck, whichever proved available, would leave Ayacucho immediately for Nueva Esperanza.

In Nueva Esperanza, Miguel began his preparations by sending for Socorro.

* * *

Jessica, Nicky and Angus looked up as a small procession filed into the area immediately outside their cells. It consisted of Miguel, Socorro, Gustavo, Ramon and one of the other men who served as guards. From their sense of purpose it was evident something was about to happen and Jessica and the others waited apprehensively to discover what.

One thing Jessica was sure of: Whatever was expected of her, she would cooperate. It was now six days since she had made the videotape recording in course of which, because of her initial defiance, Nicky had been tortured by agonizing bums. Since then, Socorro had come in daily to inspect the bums, which were sufficiently healed so that Nicky was no longer in pain. Jessica, who still felt guilty about Nicky's suffering, was determined he would not be hurt again.

Consequently, when Nicky's cell was opened and the —terrorists crowded in with Nicky, ignoring Jessica and Angus, Jessica cried out anxiously, "What are you doing? I beg of you don't hurt him. He's suffered enough. Do what you have to do to me!”

It was Socorro who swung to face Jessica and shouted through the screen between them, "Shut up! There's no way you can stop what's going to happen.”

Jessica screamed frantically, "What is happening?” Miguel, she saw, had brought a small wooden table into Nicky's cell while Gustavo and the fourth man had seized Nicky and were holding him so he was unable to move. Jessica cried again, "Oh, this isn't fair! For god's sake let him go!”

Ignoring Jessica, Socorro said to Nicky, "You're going to have two of your fingers cut off.”

At the word "fingers,” Nicky, already frantic, screamed and struggled, but to no avail.