The suspect in custody for the assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul Pelosi claimed that he was seeking to hold the Speaker hostage for a period of time and break her kneecaps, as reported by local police officials.
This past Monday, authorities held a press conference in which they unveiled various details of the event and, as part of a federal complaint stated that the suspect, David DePape, brought with him rope, zip ties, and tape in a bag. The man in custody, 42-year-old DePape, allegedly forced his way into the San Francisco home of Pelosi early Friday, discovered Paul Pelosi asleep upstairs, and heavily insisted on speaking with “Nancy,” as reported by The Associated Press.
The complaint also stated that DePape saw Speaker Pelosi as a “leader of the pack of lies told by the Democratic Party.”
“If she were to tell DePape the ‘truth,’ he would let her go and if she ‘lied,’ he was going to break her kneecaps,” highlights the complaint.” By breaking Nancy’s kneecaps, she would then have to be wheeled into Congress, which would show other members of Congress there were consequences to actions,” it states that DePape explained to police officials.
Paul Pelosi tried to escape the ordeal by getting into an elevator that had a phone, but Depape did not allow him to do so, as reported by San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins. Authorities claimed that Pelosi then asked to make use of the bathroom and used his personal cell phone to notify law enforcement. Once DePape had found out that Pelosi had called police officials, he forced him to go to the front entryway of the house, explained Jenkins. When police officers arrived at the home, DePape was wielding a hammer and “violently struck him [Pelosi] at the top of his head,” explained Jenkins.
“This house and the speaker herself were specifically targets,” stated Jenkins.
“Yes, it appears based on his statements and comments that were made in that house during his encounter with Mr. Pelosi that this was politically motivated,” explained Jenkins, going further to say that there had been “an attempt to murder her husband at the time that the police arrived.”
She also called on the public to “watch the words that we say and to turn down the volume of our political rhetoric.”
“It’s very sad to see that we are once again at a point in history where people believe that it’s okay to express their political sentiments through violence,” she stated. “I think it really demonstrates that we have to calm things down. We have to decide that we’re going to be more respectful as an American society, that it’s okay to disagree.”
Jenkins explained to the AP that officials seem to think that DePape had done quite a bit of research into Pelosi before going after the home. “This was not something that he did at the spur of the moment,” she stated.
The Department of Justice has chosen to officially slam DePape with charges of federal kidnapping and assault. He was also hit with charges of attempted murder, elder abuse, and other offenses by the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office.