‘70s Radical-Turned-Robber Withdraws Parole Bid

BOSTON — Vietnam-era radical Katherine Ann Power withdrew her request for parole after sobbing repeatedly during her hearing, especially during testimony by the family of an officer killed in the robbery she aided, witnesses said.

Clare Schroeder, the eldest of slain Officer Walter Schroeder’s children, said Power’s action Thursday night sparked a range of emotions for the family, including surprise, relief and even some pity.

“You could not be there and not feel some degree of sympathy for the very obvious pain and distress this woman was in,” Schroeder said Friday.

Power’s lawyer, Jim Doyle, said Power was pleased that she had communicated her guilt.

She has served 4 1/2 years of an 8- to 12-year sentence.

Power, 48, became a fugitive after she and four others robbed a Boston bank in September 1970. Power went underground after the heist, taking the alias Alice Metzinger.

She eventually settled near Corvallis, Ore., where she taught, worked as a chef, married and had a son, now 18. In 1993, 23 years after the crime, she turned herself in and pleaded guilty to manslaughter.