On March 30, 1981, then President Ronald Reagan was shot in the chest by would-be assassin John Hinckley Jr and he, along with 3 others, including Press Secretary James Brady, were wounded though none fatally at the time (Brady died in 2014 as a result of complications).
As a result of trying to kill the President, one would assume Hinckley would have been put to death or garnered a sentence of life in prison, which is not what happened. What did happen is Hinckley was declared to be mentally insane and sent to St. Elizabeth’s mental hospital. While this may have spared Hinckley the harshness of prison life it also meant that successful uses of the insanity defense dropped like a balloon with a 3-ton lead anchor attached to it suddenly.
The case of Mr. Hinckley could also be a part of why mental illness is treated with such a lack of seriousness in the United States as a whole, although blaming the failings of an entire system of healthcare on one man is a bit on the extreme end of the spectrum. Today there was a new development in this 35-year-old case: Hinckley will be released from St. Elizabeth’s Hospital although he must continue to stay away from the families of his shooting victims (and presumably Jodie Foster, who he was obsessed with when he shot President Reagan).
While some people, including those who head the Ronald Reagan foundation, decry the decision to release Hinckley, he has an ally in Micheal Reagan (the former President’s son) who says his father would forgive his would-be murderer if alive today (President Reagan died in 2004). I have mixed feelings about Hinckley’s release, on one hand, I want to see Hinckley successfully re-acclimate into a functioning member of society, but on the other hand, I am more than a little perturbed that a man who tried to kill the President could very soon be walking among us.
