Aiming to have an example made of her husband’s attacker, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) made her pitch for a “very long” sentence for a hammer-wielding home invader as a federal judge decided on a decades-long incarceration.
Friday, more than a year-and-a-half after Paul Pelosi was seen on police bodycam footage struck by a man later identified as David DePape in the then-House Speaker’s San Francisco residence, U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley handed the convicted man the maximum sentence for both federal charges.
While short of the 40-year sentence the prosecution had sought with a terrorism enhancement, Corley sentenced DePape to concurrent prison terms of 20 years for attempted kidnapping and 30 years for assault with an 18-month credit for time spent in custody, the maximum for the crimes committed.
In a letter filed with the court Friday, Rep. Pelosi not only talked up lasting trauma experienced by her family but invoked Jan. 6, 2021, as she requested of Corley, “It is therefore necessary that the guilty party’s sentence to be very long as a punishment for the attack and the injuries Paul continues to suffer — and as a deterrent to others considering violence against public officials.”
The reference to the breach of the U.S. Capitol was made based on reports that DePape had shouted “Where’s Nancy?” as he went through her home, “echoing the January 6th threats.”
A separate official statement from the congresswoman’s family read, “The Pelosi family couldn’t be prouder of their Pop and his tremendous courage in saving his own life on the night of the attack and in testifying in this case. Speaker Pelosi and her family are immensely grateful to all who have sent love and prayers over the last eighteen months, as Mr. Pelosi continues his recovery.”
“Given the ongoing state court proceedings, Speaker Pelosi and the Pelosi family will not be offering further comment on this matter at this time,” it added.
A spokesperson for Speaker Pelosi issued this statement on behalf of the Pelosi family: pic.twitter.com/RjbcLb3bDu
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) May 17, 2024
Meanwhile, despite Paul Pelosi’s testimony and his own letter submitted to the judge recounting the events of the Oct. 28, 2022 incident, asking her to consider “the premeditated kidnapping of my wife, the vicious assault on my life, and the ongoing physical and mental injuries caused by the defendant and sentence him to the fullest extent the law provides,” the congresswoman had claimed in her own letter that she and her husband “have not discussed the events of that horrible night…”
“Paul doesn’t want to undergo revisiting it, and the doctors’ advice is that discussing the vicious assault would only renew his trauma,” wrote Pelosi.
As Corley handed down the sentence Friday, she expressed that the convict had acted on “baseless conspiracy theories” related to the legislator and brought up his own call into a TV station after the attack where “He intentionally taunted America. When someone is considering going into public service, they have to think, ‘am I willing to risk my spouse, my children?’ Some people who may have been great leaders, are going to say, ‘It’s not worth it.'”
Judge Corley told David DePape that she gave him the max sentence for making an “unprecedented” decision to invade a politician’s home. She also admonished him for “taunting America” when he told a TV station that he wished he had the chance to attack more political targets. pic.twitter.com/JXpIYAEdvW
— Amy Larson (@AmyLarson25) May 17, 2024
Previously noted, when Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (R) had been attacked, leaving him with broken ribs and in need of lung and hernia surgeries, his assailant neighbor had received eight months behind bars and six months home detention from a federal judge AFTER initially only receiving a 30-day sentence.
DePape still faces charges in the state of California for attempted murder, burglary and assault, all of which he pled not guilty to with jury selection expected to begin Wednesday.
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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