Kathy Boudin (May 19, 1943 – May 1, 2022)^[1] was an American radical leftist who served 23 years in prison for felony murder based on her role in the 1981 Brink's robbery. Boudin was a founding member of the militant Weather Underground organization, which engaged in bombings of government buildings to express opposition to U.S. foreign policy and racism. The 1981 robbery resulted in the killing of two Nyack, New York, police officers and one security guard, and serious injury to another security guard; Boudin was arrested attempting to flee after the getaway vehicle she occupied was stopped by police.^[2] She was released on parole in 2003. After earning a doctorate, Boudin became an adjunct professor at Columbia University.^[3]

Kathy Boudin was born in Manhattan on May 19, 1943, into a Jewish family with a storied left-wing history.^[1][4] Boudin was raised in Greenwich Village, New York City. Her paternal grandparents had emigrated from Russia and Austria.^[5] Her great-uncle was Marxist theorist Louis B. Boudin, while her brother is conservative U.S. Judge Michael Boudin. Her mother was poet Jean (Roisman) Boudin, whose sister Esther was married to radical journalist I.F. Stone (making him Kathy's uncle).^[6] Her father, attorney Leonard Boudin, had represented controversial clients such as Judith Coplon,^[5] the Cuban government,^[7] and Paul Robeson.^[8] A National Lawyers Guild attorney, Leonard Boudin was the law partner of Victor Rabinowitz, himself counsel to numerous left-wing organizations.^[9] Kathy Boudin graduated from Bryn Mawr College in 1965 as class valedictorian.^[10][11] After college, she attended the Case Western Reserve University School of Law for less than a year.^[12]

Boudin met her romantic partner, David Gilbert, in the 1970s and gave birth to their son Chesa Boudin in 1980.^[13] When her son was 14 months old, she was arrested and subsequently convicted and incarcerated for felony murder based on her role as a decoy in the 1981 Brink's robbery.^[14] Her son was raised by former Weatherman leaders Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.^{[14][15][16][17]}

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In 1969, Boudin was a founding member of the Weatherman faction of Students for a Democratic Society, which in 1970 became the Weather Underground Organization (WUO). In 1970 she and Cathy Wilkerson were the only survivors of the Greenwich Village townhouse explosion, when a bomb that their comrades were constructing in the basement, intending to use it to attack U.S. Army personnel that evening, exploded prematurely, killing three of the militants and demolishing the building they were using as a hideout and bomb factory.^[18] The WUO soon after renounced actions that sought to inflict human casualties.^[19] Boudin remained a fugitive for more than a decade, engaging in multiple additional bombings (none of which resulted in injuries) and other actions.

In 1981, Boudin and several former members of the Weather Underground, with current members of the May 19th Communist Organization and the Black Liberation Army, robbed a Brink's armored car at the Nanuet Mall, in Nanuet, New York.^[20] Boudin was in the front seat of a U-Haul truck used as a switchcar getaway vehicle and also acted as a decoy. Responding police testified that when they spotted and pulled her over, Boudin feigned innocence and encouraged the two responding officers put their guns down, whereupon her accomplices leaped from the back of the truck with automatic weapons and shot officers Edward O'Grady and Waverly Brown, killing them both. In addition to the deaths of O'Grady and Brown, the robbers had already seriously wounded guard Joseph Trombino; killed his partner, Peter Paige; and injured two other police officers.^[21]

After her release from prison, Boudin accepted a job in the HIV/AIDS Clinic at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, meeting the work provisions of parole that required active job prospects.^[32] Later, she founded the Coming Home Program at the Spencer Cox Center for Health at Mt. Sinai/St.Luke’s Hospital in Morningside Heights, which provides health care for people returning from incarceration.^[33]

In May 2004 Boudin published an essay in the Fellowship of Reconciliation's publication Fellowship, expressing remorse for her participation in the Brink's robbery, which she described as "horrific."^[34] Subsequently, she received an Ed. D. from Columbia University Teachers College. In addition to her work at St. Luke's-Roosevelt, Boudin worked as a consultant to Osborne Association in the development of a Longtermers Responsibility Project taking place in the New York State Correctional Facilities, utilizing a restorative practice approach, and co-authored the Coming to Terms curriculum used in the program. She also consulted for Vermont Corrections and the Women's Prison Association and supervised social workers.^[35]

On May 1, 2022, Boudin died in New York City at the age of 78, a day after returning from a visit to San Francisco.^[1][43] According to her son Chesa Boudin, who was serving as District Attorney of San Francisco, Boudin had been battling cancer for seven years.^[43]