Lebron, Lolita (1920—)

Puerto Rican nationalist and terrorist . Born in 1920 in Puerto Rico; children: two.

On March 1, 1954, Lolita Lebron, a 34-year-old Puerto Rican seamstress, nationalist, and mother of two, led three men into the gallery of the U.S. House of Representatives, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag, and yelled "Viva Puerto Rico!" While members of the House looked up in surprise, Lebron dropped the flag, produced a Luger, and fired randomly into the assembly, as did her three companions (later identified as Irving Flores Rodriguez, Rafael Cancel Miranda, and Andres Figueroa Cordero). Although most of the representatives were able to scramble for cover, five were wounded, the most seriously being Alvin M. Bentley of Michigan, who sustained puncture wounds to his lungs and diaphragm. All would recover from their injuries.

Only minutes after the shooting, the terrorists were captured and placed under arrest. Lebron and her companions were sentenced to 75-year prison terms. For the next 25 years, some in the Hispanic community considered Lebron a political prisoner and freedom fighter. A Spanish colony until it was ceded to the United States at the end of the Spanish-American War (1898), Puerto Rico has been a self-governing commonwealth since 1952. A separatist movement against what is perceived as U.S. colonialist control of the Puerto Rican nation, which is what Lebron and her associates were protesting with their weapons, exists with little popular support. (Oscar Collazo and Griserio Torresola had also been acting in the name of the Puerto Rican independence movement when they staged an armed attack on Blair House in 1950, attempting to assassinate President Harry Truman at his temporary residence. Torresola was killed, and Collazo was wounded, tried, and sentenced to death. His sentence was later changed to life in prison.)

Puerto Rican voters rejected a referendum for independence in 1967, choosing to retain the island's commonwealth status. In September 1979, President Jimmy Carter, reacting to pressure from Puerto Rican minority groups, commuted the sentences of Lebron and the others, including Collazo, and freed them. (Cordero had been released years earlier because of terminal cancer.) Upon release, Cancel Miranda, who had mellowed over the years, said he was still a nationalist but "would rather hug people than fight them." Lebron, however, told journalists that she was an unrepentant independentista, and that she had no remorse over her actions. She continues to speak at pro-independence rallies in Puerto Rico and in the United States. In 1993, Puerto Rico again held a referendum to choose between U.S. statehood, independence, or the maintenance of commonwealth status. Both independence and statehood were rejected by voters.