Brenda Heist Arrested, Sentenced to A Year Behind Bars
Brenda Heist, the woman who ran away from her home in Pennsylvania in 2002, will be spending the next year in jail for violating terms of her probation. Heist used an alias while on the run but turned herself in to the Florida police, saying that she was homeless and exhausted.
Heist was arrested on Friday night after spending several weeks in protective custody. She was arrested for violating her parole by not reporting to her parole officer as well as stealing a driver's license. Heist worked as a live-in housekeeper for Joanna Covish at the time of her arrest.
"I hope that it opens everyone's eyes to realize that no matter how much you feel so sorry for someone, stay with your first instinct," Covish told WTSP News.
Heist dropped her children off at school in 2002 and then traveled to Florida with hitchhikers. There, she lived off the- grid and managed to remain hidden from her family for the next 11 years. Her husband had her declared legally dead in 2010, bringing a sense of closure to the family.
Then, on April 26 of this year, Heist turned herself in to South Florida police and admitted that she was a missing person. They put her back in contact with her family, but they did not want much to do with her.
"She has a birth certificate and a death certificate, so she's got a long ways to make this right again," Detective John Schofield told the Associated Press. "She's got to take it slow with her family, I'm sure, and it's going to be a long process."
"I don't think she deserves to see me," daughter Morgan told CNN. "I don't really have any plans on going to see her. This makes me really mad. I can't believe she would do that because she was a good mom. She was great. But, I mean, something happened. Something snapped in her."
