Six Shots at a Nation's Heart

By Ed Magnuson Monday, Apr. 13, 1981

    • April 13, 1981 TIME Cover: Moment of Madness
    What Happened — and Why • Can It Never Be Stopped?

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    spread open. A copy of TV Guide was near the bed. Also in the room was a newspaper clipping about the President's schedule, which disclosed that Reagan would leave the White House at 1:45 p.m. to address a session of the AFL-ClO's building and construction trades department at the Washington Hilton. The President had lunch at the White House in the family quarters. He ate an avocado and chicken salad, sliced red beets and an apple tart. Then he worked on his Hilton speech and stretched out for a brief rest.

    When he returned to the hotel about noon, Hinckley asked the desk clerk whether he had received any telephone calls. There were no telephone messages in his key box. Then at 12:45 p.m. he sat in his room and began to write a five-paragraph letter on lined note paper. It started: "Dear Jodie, There is a definite possibility that I will be killed in my attempt to get Reagan." It ended: "This letter is being written an hour before I leave for the Hilton Hotel. Jodie, I'm asking you to please look into your heart and at least give me the chance with this historical deed to gain your respect and love. I love you forever." It was signed: "John Hinckley." Hinckley sealed the letter to Actress Jodie Foster, 18, a freshman at Yale University whom he had never met, but did not mail it.

    The President climbed into his armor-plated black Lincoln limousine at 1:45 p.m. for the seven-minute drive to the Hilton. With him was Michael Deaver, his closest personal aide, Labor Secretary Ray Donovan and two Secret Service agents: Drew Unrue was driving, and Jerry Parr, chief of the presidential protection detail, sat in the right front seat. Following them in the motorcade was Presidential Press Secretary Jim Brady. Half an hour earlier, his deputy, Larry Speakes, had asked, "You going with the President to the hotel?" Brady's casual reply: "Yeah, I think I will." With other agents following in the "battlewagon" protective car, the caravan moved swiftly through the ram-slick streets to the hotel. Everything was going smoothly; the trip seemed quite routine.

    Rechecking rooms at 1:15 p.m. to replace some used towels, the maid found Hinckley in the room, wearing a light-colored jacket, sport shirt and casual pants. He stood by the bathroom door and watched without expression as she hung the towels. Shortly afterward he left for the Hilton. It was almost a mile away, less than a half-hour walk. If he went by cab or bus, he was unnoticed.

    The President received a standing ovation as he entered the Hilton's International Ballroom to address 3,500 union representatives. It was the largest audience he had faced in person since his Inauguration. As he made his pitch for the union members to support his economic program, Reagan's delivery was uncharacteristically flat. He drew only tepid applause, even meeting silence at a few punch lines. Only one sentence in the 18-minute speech would later be remembered. Noted the President: "Violent crime has surged 10%, making neighborhood streets unsafe and families fearful in their homes."

    Outside the Hilton, on an adjacent sidewalk, Hinckley was pacing nervously.

    John M. Dodson, a Pinkerton's detective AZ agency computer specialist, was watching the Hilton's lower-level VIP entrance from the seventh floor of

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