Cuba on Friday announced the death of Assata Shakur, a US citizen and Black militant who escaped prison and lived as a fugitive for decades after being convicted of killing a police officer.

“On September 25, 2025, the American citizen Joanne Deborah Byron, alias Assata Shakur, died in Havana, Cuba, due to health problems and her advanced age,” Cuba’s foreign ministry said in a brief statement on its website.

Also known as JoAnne Chesimard, she died at the age of 78.

She was a member of the Black Liberation Army, a Black nationalist militant organization that largely operated in the United States in the 1970s.

She was accused, with two others, of killing a New Jersey state trooper during a shootout at a routine traffic stop in 1973.

She briefly escaped but was arrested, charged and co

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