Assassination Attempts on The Pope and President Ronald Reagan

9. Assassination Attempts on The Pope and President Ronald Reagan

"They tried to kill the pope, Barry!" - quote from Talk Radio

More than half the world's population was not born or was less than 10 years old when a 23-year-old Turk named Mehmet Ali Agca shot Pope John Paul II four times with a 9-mm pistol from a distance of 15 feet as the pope drove through a crowd of 20,000 in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981.http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/4/5/160320.shtml

Monday - March 30 (1981)

I was almost to the car when I heard what sounded like two or three firecrackers over to my left - just a small fluttering sound, pop, pop, pop. I turned and said, "What the hell's that?" Just then, Jerry Parr, the head of our Secret Service unit, grabbed me by the waist and literally hurled me into the back of the limousine. I landed on my face atop the armrest across the back seat and Jerry jumped on top of me. When he landed, I felt a pain in my upper back that was unbelievable. It was the most excruciating pain I had ever felt. "Jerry," I said, "get off, I think you've broken one of my ribs."

Little by little, though, I learned what had happened and what the situation was: I had a bullet in my lung; Service agent Tim McCarthy had been shot in the chest; policeman Tom Delehanty had been shot in the neck. All of us had been hit by the gun of a young lone assailant who was in police custody. When Jim Brady, a funny and irreverent man who was as talented and well liked as anyone in the White House, was wheeled by me unconscious on his way to the operating room, someone told me he was hit so badly he probably wouldn't make it, and I quickly said a prayer for him. http://www.ronaldreagan.com/march30.html