Liz Heidhues 11.4.2023
Sometimes I feel like despairing.
I still feel emotional pain and anger at the political lynching of Chesa Boudin on June 7, 2022, when the scheming ultra-wealthy Machiavellian toadstools, funding the recall campaign, when the POA, in retaliation for being held accountable for abuses of power, fomented lies about Chesa, when the pitchfork mob seeking a scapegoat raised public strife against Chesa, succeeded in taking Chesa away from me. I had campaigned for Chesa for DA and for the “No On H” anti-recall campaign.
I became friends with Chesa Boudin after I was falsely arrested and falsely imprisoned by two Citizen’s Arrests in my old age. The brutality I experienced at the hands of SFPD and the degradation and indignities I suffered in jail will live within me until my grave, due to my having endured these injustices towards the end of my life.
Chesa was the only person before whom I would break down and weep when he came to talk with me in a visitor’s room behind a thickly walled, soundproof partition. As the warden took me from my jail cell, she said to me “Your attorney is here to see you”. In astonishment, I asked myself “What attorney? I don’t have an attorney”.
I didn’t know what rights I had, since I had never experienced an arrest nor had ever been confined to a human cage, which is exactly what a jail cell is. Because I was desperate to find out whether my husband was ok, I decided to talk to this stranger with eyes that gripped mine with intensity. But as soon as I began speaking, Chesa stopped me, shook his head, and then pointed to the wall over on my side of the room where a phone receiver dangled without moorings.
When the sheer horror that I was now imprisoned in a soundproof room where I could not be heard by another human being, that I was now wearing lurid, fluorescent orange prison attire from head to foot instead of my own clothing, that my freedom and my identity had been stripped from me for having done nothing wrong, tore into my brain, I broke down and wept in front of Chesa. Chesa’s eyes had been the first compassionate eyes I had seen during the nightmarish ordeal of my first False Citizen’s Arrest.
Chesa was the friend I turned to for inspiration when struggling with the cruel attacks on my character during our lawsuit against the people who carried out my two False Citizen’s Arrests. Their defense attorneys, wanting to win the case at any cost, waged a war against my husband and I, who are elderly and could never match their fat War Chest funded by 30-billion-dollar insurance companies. Chesa reminded me “You survived jail, you can survive this”. And so I continued our costly and draining fight for justice until we finally prevailed.
‘Beyond Bars’ is Chesa’s story of the children of incarcerated parents yet it is also a story about the inhumane world waiting for those who are incarcerated and stripped of their dignity and basic human rights.
Chesa’s documentary shows the importance of family bonds and how families are broken and destroyed by the incarceration of parents. My own family did not escape the fallout from my two False Citizen’s Arrests. ‘Beyond Bars’ is a strong statement that justice must be defined, not by punishment, but by alternatives to incarceration.
Note: Liz Heidhues, 73, is a native of San Francisco. Mother. Grandparent. Educator. Athlete. Prior to April 12, 2018 Liz had never encountered law enforcement or the judicial system. On that day she was the subject of the first of two false citizen’s arrests. The second took place less than two years later. Both false citizens arrests were discharged by the Superior Court. Liz filed a lawsuit against the perpetrators and prevailed. But, the emotional and financial price to fight for her rights was devastating. Chesa Boudin was one person who felt Liz’ pain and was there for her in her moments of need.
Lee Heidhues contributed to this blog post.
Top photo: Liz Heidhues at left wearing sunglasses with Chesa in front of the San Francisco Hall of Justice – April 30, 2019
Lee's Perspective 