Would-be Reagan assassin to be released after 35 years
WASHINGTON — John Hinckley Jr. has spent years fighting to be fully freed from the mental hospital where he has been held since being found not guilty by reason of insanity for shooting President Reagan and three other men.
Next week he will finally win his release — sort of.
U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman ruled Wednesday that the would-be assassin will be freed Aug. 5 from St. Elizabeths to live full time with his mother in Virginia. But the order came with a laundry list of conditions and restrictions.
Friedman’s ruling was not a surprise, especially to those who have followed the saga of Hinckley’s life and the dozens of hearings in recent years that delved into the minutiae of his mental well-being. Increasingly in recent years, he has been granted many temporary unsupervised trips off the hospital’s grounds.
In ordering Hinckley’s release, Friedman wrote that the presidential assailant no longer posed a threat to himself or others and that his psychotic disorder and major depression have been in remission for more than 20 years. Hinckley has displayed “no symptoms of active mental illness, exhibited no violent behavior, shown no interest in weapons,” nor exhibited any signs of being suicidal, Friedman wrote.
Federal prosecutors, who have long battled Hinckley’s doctors and lawyers over his expanding privileges, said they were reviewing the order and declined to comment.
Hinckley’s lawyer, Barry Levine, said he and his client were pleased with the decision.
“This has been a matter of mixed emotions for the family. John recognizes, and has long recognized, A judge has ruled John Hinckley Jr. will be allowed to leave a Washington mental hospital and live full time in Virginia. that what he did 35 years ago was horrific, and he is profoundly sorry for what he did,” Levine said. “He has worked hard with his mental health providers, and I believe the disease from which he suffered years and years and years ago no longer plagues him.”
Michael Reagan, a son of the former president, wrote on Twitter that his father had famously forgiven Hinckley and “maybe we should do the same.”
But Reagan’s daughter, Patti Davis, expressed some resignation, blogging that she was “not surprised by this latest development, but my heart is sickened.”
Much has changed since a deranged 25-year-old struggling musician, obsessed with a movie star, pulled out a gun on March 30, 1981, and with six quick shots altered the trajectory of a presidency and the lives of those he wounded, including Reagan, White House Press Secretary Jim Brady, Secret Service Agent Tim McCarthy and Washington, D.C., police Officer Thomas Delahanty.
Today Hinckley, 61, is “suffering from arthritis, high blood pressure and various other physical ailments like many men his age,” Friedman wrote.
Federal prosecutors acknowledged in court papers that Hinckley was “clinically ready” to live in Williamsburg, but expressed concerns that the hospital had not fully addressed several issues, including his family’s financial stability and the possibility that his mental state could rapidly decline.
Friedman took more than a year to issue a 103-page opinion and 14page order explaining his ruling and laying out more than two dozen conditions.
Among the judge’s restrictions, Hinckley must meet monthly with St. Elizabeths’ doctors in Washington and attend regular sessions with therapists and a psychiatrist in Williamsburg.
He may not publish any writings or photographs on the Internet without the approval of his doctors and cannot establish any social media accounts. He will be required to carry a GPSenabled cellphone and must decline all media interview requests.
For the next year, Hinckley will reside with his mother; if things go well, the judge wrote, he may obtain permission to live on his own.
In a year to 18 months, the hospital is required to conduct a risk assessment that could result in reducing the restrictions or removing him from court supervision.