Ronald Reagan, U.S. President, faced an assassination attempt in 1981
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Executive summary
On March 30, 1981, John W. Hinckley Jr. fired six shots outside the Washington Hilton, wounding President Ronald Reagan and three others; Reagan was struck once by a bullet that lodged an inch from his heart and he lost more than half his blood volume before surgeons removed the projectile, after which he spent 13 days hospitalized and returned to the White House on April 11 [1] [2] [3]. Hinckley was arrested at the scene, later found not guilty by reason of insanity in 1982, and committed to St. Elizabeth’s Hospital [4] [5].
1. The shooting: quick, chaotic, and consequential
At about 2:27 p.m. on March 30, 1981, John Hinckley opened fire from behind a rope line as President Reagan exited the Washington Hilton after a speech; witnesses and official timelines report six shots in roughly 1.7 seconds that wounded Reagan, press secretary James Brady, Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy and D.C. police officer Thomas Delahanty [1] [2] [6]. Secret Service agents—most notably Jerry Parr—reacted immediately, shoving Reagan into the limousine and rerouting it to George Washington University Hospital, actions later credited with saving the president’s life [1].
2. The medical ordeal and survival that reshaped public perception
Reagan was struck once beneath the left armpit by a bullet that ricocheted off the presidential limousine; he lost a large volume of blood, required emergency surgery to remove the slug an inch from his heart, and remained hospitalized for nearly two weeks before returning to the White House—an episode that generated widespread sympathy and, according to historians, altered the course of his early presidency [7] [2] [3] [8].
3. The shooter’s motive, arrest and legal outcome
Hinckley, 25 at the time, had developed an obsession with actress Jodie Foster and the film Taxi Driver, which prosecutors and historians cite as part of his motive for seeking notoriety; he was arrested at the scene, charged federally, and in June 1982 was found not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to a psychiatric hospital [6] [4] [9].
4. Institutional aftershocks: Secret Service, protocols and investigations
The attempt exposed procedural gaps: the Secret Service’s movement and medical-evacuation practices were scrutinized and revised after the incident [6]. The FBI opened an extensive investigation (code-named REAGAT) and compiled a prosecutive report for the Justice Department as it weighed charges against Hinckley [10].
5. How contemporaneous actors handled command and messaging
Inside the White House the day of the shooting, senior officials improvised: Al Haig’s public claim “I’m in control here” drew controversy for its constitutional implications and highlighted confusion over protocol and succession during the crisis [11]. Taped Situation Room discussions and subsequent memoirs revealed intense debate among Reagan’s aides and national-security officials in the hours following the shooting [12].
6. Lasting legal and cultural effects
The Hinckley verdict—not guilty by reason of insanity—spurred national debate over the insanity defense and led to calls for legal reform; the case became a touchstone in discussions about mental illness, criminal responsibility, and gun violence [4] [6]. Culturally, the attempt entered the public record through museum exhibits, FBI artifacts (including limousine fragments), and oral histories that preserve the event’s details [7] [13] [3].
7. Divergent interpretations and limitations in the record
Contemporaneous sources agree on core facts—date, shooter, victims, medical outcome and legal disposition—but they diverge in emphasis: some accounts foreground Reagan’s political rebound and sympathy surge [2] [4], while others stress procedural failures and the Secret Service’s subsequent reforms [6] [1]. Available sources do not mention certain speculative claims about alternate conspirators or unreported injuries not documented in the cited records (not found in current reporting).
8. Why this episode still matters
Beyond a near-fatal attack on an American president, the 1981 attempt changed executive-protection practices, tested legal boundaries around insanity pleas, and shaped Reagan’s political capital during his first months in office; the official records and retrospective reporting compiled by the Secret Service, FBI, historians and the Reagan Library form a consistent documentary backbone for those conclusions [5] [10] [7] [2].
Limitations: this summary draws only on the provided documents; for deeper forensic, medical or legal analysis consult the full FBI REAGAT files, medical case reports and the trial transcript, which are referenced in these sources but not reproduced here [10] [8] [4].