David DePape, 44, the man who violently attacked former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul Pelosi with a hammer when he burst into their San Francisco, California, home in 2022, has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.
As Law&Crime previously reported, a federal jury found DePape guilty of two charges including attempting to kidnap a federal official and assaulting an immediate family member of a federal official with intent to retaliate against the official for performance of their duties. Prosecutors had initially requested 40 years; his defense attorneys asked for 14.
Attached to a supplemental memorandum filed before U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Corley delivered DePape his sentence, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi emphasized how terrifying the ordeal was for her family and how DePape’s calls of “Where’s Nancy” on the day of her husband’s assault were “echoing the January 6th threats” that once “filled me with great fear and deep pain.”
Despite Paul Pelosi’s “courageous efforts” to save his own life, whether it was by trying to escape down an elevator, calling the police or then asking DePape to go outside, Nancy Pelosi told the court, nonetheless, her husband had nearly been killed and 18 months after the attack, the signs of DePape’s invasion were still “impossible to avoid” in their home.
“Our home remains a heartbreaking crime scene,” Pelosi wrote in the May 17 letter.
The former longtime House Speaker said her husband still suffers from dizziness, fainting spells and regular bruising because now he falls down more often.
Notably, she told the judge she and her husband do not speak of the night of the attack.
“Paul doesn’t want to undergo revisiting it and the doctors’ advice is that discussing the vicious assault would only renew his trauma,” she added.
A fear of a copycat attack is still palpable for her, she said.
Corley looked on DePape’s conduct with considerable shock.
“He actually went to the home, that is completely, completely unprecedented,” Corley said, according to the AP.
At trial, DePape admitted that he intended to break Nancy Pelosi’s kneecaps and hold her hostage and he confessed during trial to battering Paul Pelosi with the hammer after police arrived at the house during the Oct. 28, 2022, invasion.
DePape was an adherent to the QAnon conspiracy theory and his defense attorneys relied on his being swept up in that as cause for leniency at sentencing and sympathy from jurors.
Paul Pelosi had testified that it was a “tremendous shock” when DePape, who came equipped with zip ties, rope, a camera and computer and tablet, woke him after breaking in.
He said “looking at him and looking at the hammer and the ties,” he knew he had to stay “as calm as possible” in the hope that could de-escalate DePape’s furor.
This is not the end of the road for DePape. He must also face a series of charges in state court now that the federal matter has been resolved. Jury trial for an assault with deadly weapon charge, elder abuse and other offenses goes forward May 22 with jury selection.
The post ‘Echoing the January 6th threats’: Man who attacked Nancy Pelosi’s husband in brazen hammer break-in and attempted kidnapping is sentenced first appeared on Law & Crime.
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Author: Brandi Buchman
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