This episode appears to be based on the three different cases/incidents including:
- The 1975 Sara Jane Olson case. Born Kathleen Soliah, Olson was a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) in the 1970s, who went into hiding in 1976 after having been indicted in a bombing case. She lived much of her life in Minnesota under her new name, which she changed to be her legal name. She was eventually arrested in 1999, and plead guilty in 2001 to two counts of possessing explosives with intent to murder, and in 2003 to second-degree murder, both stemming from her SLA activities in the 1970s. She received a sentence of 14 years in prison.
- The 1993 Katherine Ann Power case. Power is an American ex-convict and long-time fugitive, who along with her fellow student and accomplice Susan Edith Saxe, was placed on the F.B.I's Most Wanted Fugitives list in 1970. The two participated in robberies at a Massachusetts National Guard armory and a bank in Brighton, Massachusetts where Boston police officer Walter Schroeder was shot and killed. Power remained at large for 23 years. Power turned herself over to authorities in 1993 after starting a new life in Oregon. She pleaded guilty and was imprisoned in Massachusetts for six years before being released on 14 years' probation.
- The Weathermen underground anti-war movement. The Weathermen were a radical left militant organization active in the late 1960s and 1970s, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan.
- The 1981 Brink's robbery. On October 20, 1981, six Black Liberation Army members: Mutulu Shakur, Kuwasi Balagoon, Solomon Bouines (Samuel Brown), Mtayari Shabaka Sundiata, Edward Joseph, and Cecilio "Chui" Ferguson; and four former members of the Weather Underground, now belonging to the May 19th Communist Organization, consisting of David Gilbert, Judith Alice Clark, Kathy Boudin, and Marilyn Buck stole $1.6 million in cash from a Brink's armored car at the Nanuet Mall, in Nanuet, New York. They killed Brinks guard, Peter Paige as well as seriously wounding Brinks guard Joseph Trombino and slightly wounding Brinks truck driver guard, James Kelly. Subsequently, they killed two Nyack police officers, Edward O'Grady and Waverly Brown, as well as seriously wounding Police Detective Artie Keenan.The first to be tried were Donald Weems (aka Kuwasi Balagoon) and 19 May Communists David Gilbert and Judith Alice Clark amid a heavy police presence. They represented themselves and were given three consecutive 25-year to life sentences. Weems said, "As to the 75 years in prison, I am not really worried because the State simply isn't going to last 75 or even 50 years." He died of Aids on 13 December 1986. Boudin was sentenced to 20 years to life. She was paroled in 2003. Samuel Brown was sentenced to 75 years to life. Williams was jailed for 60 years in 1988.
Alcoholic cardiomyopathy is a form of dilated cardiomyopathy which is a condition where the heart becomes enlarged and cannot pump blood effectively due to swelling or stretching of the heart muscle. In the case of alcoholic cardiomyopathy large amounts of alcohol have a toxic effect on the heart muscle causing it to become weakened and stretched out. This in turn causes the ventricles (the lower chambers of the heart) to become larger than normal and because you have a larger space that is filled with the same amount of fluid with weakened, damaged muscles the blood is no longer under a sufficient amount of pressure for it to be properly circulated throughout the entire body.