June 17, 1969: Black Panther William Lee Brent Hijacks Trans World Airlines Flight 154

June 17 1969, former Black Panther William Lee Brent hijacked Trans World Airlines flight 154 from Oakland to New York, redirecting it to Cuba. Brent was fleeing prison time stemming from a San Francisco shootout that injured three police in November 1968.

Brent, a captain in the Black Panther Party, had been expelled for “banditry” after the 1968 incident. According to Brent, he had stayed up for five days straight doing Party work, drinking fortified wine and taking dexedrine (and other pills provided by Party leaders).

While on assignment, he stopped to fill up the Black Panther Newspaper truck with gas. The attendant saw a 9mm automatic in his waistband and, fearful, handed him the money from the register. Brent took the money, later claiming he was too high to realize what had happened.

A shootout with police followed, during which multiple cops were seriously injured. Every Party member in the truck was arrested. Brent was soon expelled from the Black Panther Party, accused of being either a police agent or insane.

Abandoned by the Party and facing prison time, Brent’s only support came from the radical hippie community in Berkeley, where he had forged many close relationships. Out of options, he bought a beat-up pistol from a drug dealer and used it to hijack a flight out of Oakland.

The flight to Cuba was the longest plane hijacking in US history at the time. Once in Havana, Brent was quickly taken to prison, where he lived in harsh conditions for almost two years. He later found out that Eldridge Cleaver told the Cuban government he was a police informant.

After 22 months, Brent was released from prison and moved to “Hijack House,” a collective house of left-wingers from around the world who had hijacked planes to Cuba, among them a member of San Francisco’s Los Siete de la Raza. Brent lived in Cuba until his death in 2006.