ON THIS DAY

 

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March 30, 1981:

US President Ronald Reagan is shot and wounded.

On March 30, 1981, Ronald Reagan, then president of the United States, was shot and wounded by John Hinckley Jr. in Washington, D.C., as Reagan was returning to his limousine after a speaking engagement at the Washington Hilton hotel. Hinckley believed the attack would impress the actress Jodie Foster, with whom he had developed an erotomanic obsession after viewing her in the 1976 film Taxi Driver.

Reagan was seriously wounded by a revolver bullet that ricocheted off the side of the presidential limousine and hit him in the left underarm, breaking a rib, puncturing a lung, and causing serious internal bleeding. He then underwent emergency exploratory surgery. He recovered and was released from the hospital on April 11.

White House press secretary James Brady, Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy, and D.C. police officer Thomas Delahanty were also wounded. All three survived, but Brady suffered brain damage and was permanently disabled. His death in 2014 was considered a homicide because it was ultimately caused by his injury.

Ronald Reagan waves just before he is shot. From left are advance man Rick Ahearn; Jerry Parr, in a white trench coat, who pushed Reagan into the limousine; press secretary James Brady, who was seriously wounded by a gunshot to the head; Reagan; aide Michael Deaver; an unidentified policeman; policeman Thomas Delahanty, who was shot in the neck; and secret service agent Tim McCarthy, who was shot in the chest.

On June 21, 1982, Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity on charges of attempting to assassinate the president. He remained confined to St. Elizabeth's Hospital, a psychiatric facility in Washington, D.C. In January 2015, federal prosecutors announced that they would not charge Hinckley with Brady's death, despite the medical examiner's classification of his death as a homicide. Hinckley was discharged from his institutional psychiatric care on September 10, 2016.

The incident was a traumatic experience for the 18-year-old Foster, who was hounded by the media and paparazzi in its aftermath. She took a semester off at Yale and had to be escorted by a bodyguard everywhere she went.

On September 10, 2016, Hinckley was permitted to permanently leave the hospital to live with his mother full-time, under court supervision and with mandatory psychiatric treatment.

The not-guilty verdict led to widespread dismay and, as a result, the U.S. Congress and a number of states rewrote laws regarding the insanity defense. The old Model Penal Code test was replaced by a test that shifts the burden of proof regarding a defendant's sanity from the prosecution to the defendant. Three states have abolished the defense altogether.

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