Assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan

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Arrest of John Hinckley Jr. after the shooting at Reagan

The assassination of the then US President Ronald Reagan was in the afternoon of March 30th, 1981 at 14:27 local time ( EST ) before the Hilton Hotel in Washington, DC by John Hinckley, Jr. committed. Ronald Reagan and the three other injured survived the attack.

Perpetrator

motive

John Hinckley Jr. was to later court order insane and mentally ill . His motives for the assassination attempt on Reagan were that he wanted to go down in history and - more importantly - to impress the Jodie Foster , actress of the drama Taxi Driver , whom he idolized .

Hinckley before the assassination attempt

Hinckley arrived in Washington, DC on the evening of March 29th, checked in and stayed at the Park Central Hotel. The next morning he had breakfast at a McDonald's fast food restaurant near the hotel, after which he went back there. Fearing that he would not survive the assassination attempt, he wrote a letter to Jodie Foster in which he described his love to her again and justified himself that he wanted to kill Reagan only for her. However, he did not send this letter.

The assassination

Ronald Reagan just before the assassination attempt

At 2:27 p.m. Reagan, after attending a union event, surrounded by his bodyguards , walked down the street towards the parked presidential limo. When he was almost there - the distance was about one to three meters - he waved to the photographers. At that moment several shots were fired; the fifth bullet ricocheted off the limo's bulletproof window glass, seriously injuring Reagan. A total of six shots were fired in the direction of the president. This met the White House Press Secretary , James Brady , who sustained brain damage and paralysis suffered, the police officer Thomas K. Delahanty and the Secret Service -Beamten Tim McCarthy , who stood in the line of fire. Reagan, who was also hit, was pushed into the limo, which drove off immediately.

After the assassination

Reagan

Since Reagan was initially considered unharmed, it was decided to drive the US president back to the White House . It was only shortly afterwards that the Secret Service agent Jerry Parr (1930-2015) noticed that Reagan was bleeding, whereupon he was immediately taken to the emergency room at George Washington University Hospital . The bullet that struck the President had entered the side of the left lung and caused profuse internal bleeding. Since the hospital staff initially had no knowledge of a shot at Reagan, it was initially assumed that there was a heart attack . One or more broken ribs (as a result of the president being pushed into the limo by his bodyguard during the assassination) could also be the cause of the shortness of breath . For these reasons, the attending physician did not immediately look for a gunshot wound on the President's body. It was his low blood pressure that gave him the idea of ​​looking for one . Because the bullet hole was very small (caliber .22 lfB ), the wound was bleeding barely visible from the outside and could therefore easily be overlooked.

Despite his injury, Reagan did not lose his sense of humor. He said to his wife: "Honey, I forgot to duck" ("Honey, I forgot to duck"), and to the operating doctors shortly before the anesthesia: "Please tell me you're all Republicans." "Please tell me that you are all Republicans .") The executive chief doctor Giordano replied: "We're all Republicans today." ("Today we are all Republicans.") Reagan had an operation and was discharged from the hospital after ten days .

Hinckley

Hinckley was pushed to the ground and held down seconds after the shot was fired by various reporters and Secret Service agents. He was arrested and later acquitted in a lawsuit for insanity . Hinckley was admitted to the Saint Elisabeth Hospital in Washington, DC for preventive detention. In 1999 he was allowed to leave the institution to visit his family. However, this rule was revoked when it was discovered that Hinckley had smuggled material about Jodie Foster into the hospital. In 2004 he was again granted the visiting regulations. Hinckley was released from the mental hospital on September 10, 2016.

literature

Web links

Commons : Assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Marc Pitzke: Assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan. "Attention, there was a shot!" Spiegel Online . March 25, 2011, accessed September 11, 2016.
  2. ^ Health and Medical History of American Presidents. Ronald Reagan: Chronology of the Shooting. doctorzebra.com. Retrieved September 11, 2016.
  3. ↑ The Eternal Leper , article from December 19, 2003 by Marc Pitzke on Spiegel Online
  4. ↑ John Hinckley Jr, Reagan's would-be assassin, released after 35 years - BBC News. In: bbc.com. Retrieved September 10, 2016 .

Coordinates: 38 ° 54'58 "  N , 77 ° 2'43.4"  W.