The return of the fugitive

Meeting her again eight months later
Summer was closing in on Las Vegas when we went to see Heather Tallchief again—at the very jail in which she’d been locked up after  surrendering to U.S. marshals.  She’s been here 8 months— from middle class Europe to a 10- by 12-foot cell.

Keith Morrison: How many hours of the day are you in your cell?

Heather Tallchief: 23.

Morrison: One hour out.

Heather Tallchief: That’s right.

Back in Amsterdam, she had left not only her son, but a man named Robert Wallace.  They had been a couple for eight years, lived as a family, but heather knew she couldn’t marry him because she didn’t have a real identity. And he didn’t know her past.

Morrison: How do you tell someone like Robert?

Heather Tallchief: Oh, slowly. (laughs) Very slowly.

Was it easy to hear? No, it was not. Robert agreed to speak to us only on condition we hide his face.

Robert Wallace: I’m trying to hide my identity from this Solis person that is still out there somewhere. I know he’s a very dangerous person. I know he doesn’t care about life.

But there was Robert, caring about life more than he ever had before, and the love of his life had this awful story.

Wallace: I didn’t believe it to begin with. I thought it was just one too many drinks or just fantasizing or something.

And so, with Robert raising her son thousands of miles away, Heather went before a judge in Las Vegas, where the prosecutor portrayed her not as Roberto Solis’ brainwashed victim, but as a life-long criminal herself.

Heather Tallchief: I remember standing up in front of the judge saying, “but I’m not a life-long criminal.” And I don’t view myself as a criminal. I’ve done some pretty stupid stuff.

Stupid stuff?  Stealing 3 million dollars?  Going on the lam for more than a decade?

A little more than just stupid, said the prosecutor—and more than a few detractors who have heard Heather’s story tend to think...

Morrison: This is all an act. You’re an actress, you’re putting all of this on. You’re playing goodie two-shoes that did this for all the right reasons, in order to get off easy.

Heather Tallchief: Well, would I, willingly put myself in prison? I mean, I didn’t know. I could’ve been looking at 30 years’ time. So is that an act? You know, who does that?

In the end, Heather took her lumps. And in a deal with the prosecution, she pled guilty to three felonies, including using her false identity to get back into the United States to surrender.  She told prosecutors she had no idea where Solis was.

She was sentenced to just over five years in prison.

And now she says she is making the best of it, staying calm in that little cell with yoga.

Morrison: There will be some people who will say, hearing this sort of thing, you’re not miserable enough. You’re not being punished enough.

Heather Tallchief: Well, I don’t choose to be miserable. If I wanted to, I could very well be. This is very hard to do, to every day get up and be conscious of what I’m doing. And to at least find some amount of joy in what I do have. And to actually be grateful for something small as, maybe, my health.

But of course she has far more than that. 

She has her American family again.

Fred Tallchief: My prayers have been answered, you know? I’ve got my child back alive. And everything from there is just gravy.

And back in Amsterdam, she has Dylan, and could finally tell him that his world is bigger than he thought it was.

Dylan Tallchief: In one letter she sent me she told me all the addresses of all my relatives and suddenly all these people started sending messages to me and letters.

Morrison: You’re part of something a lot bigger.

Dylan Tallchief: Yeah.

Morrison: How’s that?

Dylan Tallchief: Makes me feel big.

And how does his feel about his mother turning herself in?

Dylan Tallchief: It’s good that she’s doing this. And she’s making our life better. So it’s better to get all the bad things done.

Morrison: Get them outta the way.

Dylan Tallchief: Yeah.

And yet they’ll be apart for years.

Morrison: Do you still think it was the right thing to do?

Heather Tallchief: Absolutely, yes. Yeah.  I committed a crime. And yes, it is the right thing to do.

And on the other side of the world, a lesson in patience.

Morrison: You’ll have to wait for awhile before you get a chance to live with her again.

Dylan Tallchief: Yeah.

Morrison: Several years.

Dylan Tallchief: Yeah.

Morrison: Can you do that?

Dylan Tallchief: I can try. I have to.

Dylan goes by the name Dylan Tallchief now. His mother's lawyer says it will take a few months to make that his legal name, so he can get a passport and visit his mother in the U.S..

MORE FROM DATELINE

Dateline Section Front

NBC's People of the Year: Read the interviews The Night Mary Jane Disappeared The Friday the 13th Mystery Mystery at Lost Dog Road Slideshow: Photos in the Bob Duke case When The Smoke Clears   Sneak peek: When The Smoke Clears Slideshow: The Christie Fleming murder Transcript: Dan Brown and Secrets Of The Lost Symbol Through The Pouring Rain Dateline Section Front   Add Dateline headlines to your news reader: