Until the attempt on Donald Trump’s life last summer, the most serious assassination attempt in recent American history came on March 30, 1981.
President Ronald Reagan had just emerged from a speech at a downtown Washington hotel. From behind a nearby rope line emerged a young man with a gun. John Hinckley Jr fired six shots, hitting Reagan and three other people before he was subdued.
And the Secret Service agent who subdued him was 46-year-old veteran Agent Dennis McCarthy.
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McCarthy spent the next several hours guarding Hinckley, who was, of course, later found not guilty by reason of insanity. You’ll hear Dennis McCarthy’s take on that in the interview just ahead.
I met agent McCarthy in 1985 when he wrote a book called Protecting The President. And he had a startling Revelation in that book, which you’ll hear about.
So here now, from 1985, Dennis McCarthy.
Dennis McCarthy died in 1993. He was 58.