article_snippet.sent: All three men were members of the Republic of New Afrika, a black power militant group that sought to break off Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina into a separate nation for African-Americans.
article_snippet.sent: All three men were on the way from California to the South with a car loaded with weapons to support the cause.
article_snippet.sent: their rented Ford Galaxie sedan was found the next day abandoned with three military rifles, a 12-gauge shotgun, "revolutionary literature," bomb-making materials and hundreds of rounds of ammunition .
article_snippet.sent: For 19 days, Hill said, the men hid out in the New Mexico desert, working on an escape plan as 250 law enforcement officers closed in.
article_snippet.sent: the men, Kassetas said, commandeered a tow truck at gunpoint, crashed through a fence onto the runway of Albuquerque International Airport and ran up the gangway to TWA Flight 106.
article_snippet.sent: the fugitives were dirty and stunk from hiding out in the hills," Elizabeth Walthall told CNN from Elizabeth Walthall home in North Carolina.