Location: Marina del Rey, California
Details: Chet Young confronted Lennon at his car in the parking lot at work. He shot Lennon with a .303 rifle in the back as he was running away, then again in the temple. Young was an obsessive fan of Lennon's daughters and had stalked them for seven years. He had earlier threatened to kill President Lyndon Johnson and was arrested by the Secret Service.
12. Date: November 25, 1970
Target: Municipal Court Judge James N. Colasonto
Location: Alexandria, Virginia
Details: Colasonto answered a knock on his front door around 7:00 a.m. and was shot five times. He died two days later. The shooter, Theobalt Magnini, called a local radio reporter to confess. He later committed suicide. Magnini explained that he had held a grudge against the judge for five years. Court records showed that in 1966, Magnini issued a summons against a neighbor for maintaining a vicious dog. The judge ruled that city ordinances prohibited such a classification unless the dog had bitten two people. He suggested the proper charge was running at large, but Magnini did not pursue it. In January 1969, Magnini again appeared before the judge on a traffic ticket, which the judge dismissed. A recent issue of Washingtonian magazine described Colasonto as an inferior judge. A week before the shooting, Magnini's wife and daughter moved out of the house. The vicious dog was a Chihuahua.
13. Date: May 15, 1972
Target: Presidential Candidate & Alabama Governor George Wallace
Location: Laurel, Maryland
Details: Wallace was working a rope line at a political rally when Arthur Bremer opened fire with a .38 revolver. Wallace was wounded four times, along with Secret Service Agent Nick Zarvos and Alabama State Police Captain E. C. Dothard, who were both on his security detail. Bremer was arrested, convicted, and served 35 years in prison. (1-STARS: Management of the incident immediately after the attack favorably influenced safety/survival.)
14. Date: November 4, 1974
Target: Magistrate Judge Joseph J. Crescente
Location: Wanaque, New Jersey
Details: While presiding over night court, Crescente was killed by a sniper. Four teenage boys were charged in the shooting. One of the boys had been ordered from the courtroom earlier that evening for creating a disturbance. The boys discussed burning a police car, but decided to shoot the judge instead. The shooter fired twice through the courtroom window, hitting the judge in the back.
15. Date: September 21, 1976
Target: Chilean Ambassador Orlando Letelier
Location: Washington, D.C.
Details: Letelier was being driven to work when a remote-controlled limpet mine under his car exploded, killing him and passenger Ronni Moffitt. Two Cubans who were tailing Letelier's car detonated the bomb using a radio pager as an initiator.
16. Date: March 6, 1978
Target: Magazine Publisher Larry Flynt
Location: Lawrenceville, Georgia
Details: Flynt was walking into the courthouse for his highly publicized trial on obscenity charges. A sniper's bullet struck lawyer Gene Reeves in the arm. A second shot struck Flynt in the stomach. Flynt required more than a dozen surgeries to save his life, but he was paralyzed from the waist down. The shooting of Flynt was one of more than 20 shootings in 12 states over a three-year period by Joseph Paul Franklin, a rare non-professional serial assassin. The shooting spree was against people that Franklin viewed as promoting "race mixing." Franklin is currently in prison, though he was never charged with the Flynt shooting. (See also Case #22.)
17. Date: November 21, 1978
Target: Assistant U.S. Attorney James Kerr
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Details: Kerr led the investigation into the Chagra family's connection to a drug smuggling operation out of Mexico. As he drove to work, he pulled up behind a panel van. Seeing the barrel of a rifle emerging from the back window, Kerr dove under the dashboard just as his windshield erupted from a spray of bullets. He was slightly injured by glass cuts.
18. Date: November 28, 1978
Target: Mayor George Moscone & City Supervisor Harvey Milk
Location: San Francisco, California
Details: Former policeman Dan White entered city hall by climbing through a cellar window to avoid the magnetometers in the lobby. He went to Moscone's office and demanded to be reinstated to his city supervisor position. When Moscone refused, White shot him five times with a .38 revolver. White then reloaded and went to Milk's office, and shot him five times. Both men died instantly. White was convicted of manslaughter in a controversial trial. He was released in January 1984, and committed suicide in October 1985.
19. Date: December 21, 1978
Target: Assistant U.S. Attorney Barry Leibowitz
Location: Washington, D.C.
Details: Leibowitz was shot in the courthouse parking lot at mid-morning. Two men in a car drove up to him and the passenger fired twice with a .22. The first shot sliced off Leibowitz's tie, the second shot hit near his hip. The assailant escaped. Liebowitz was prosecuting a large drug case involving Robert Willie Young. The shooting may have been to scare the witnesses.
20. Date: May 29, 1979
Target: Federal Judge John Wood
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Details: Wood was shot to death by a sniper round while he was getting in his car at his home. Charles Harrelson, a killer-for-hire, later confessed to the shooting. A drug dealer whose case Wood was to hear had promised Harrelson $250,000. Harrelson was sent to prison for life.
21. Date: March 14, 1980
Target: Former Congressman Allard Lowenstein
Location: New York, New York
Details: Lowenstein was shot to death in his law office by Dennis Sweeney, a former acquaintance. Sweeney, a civil rights volunteer in Lowenstein's voter registration drives in Mississippi in the mid-1960s, fired five bullets into the congressman, then waited for police to arrive. During his trial, Sweeney testified that Lowenstein and others in the CIA controlled him through radio receivers planted in his teeth. He was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and found not guilty by reason of insanity.
22. Date: May 29, 1980
Target: Civil Rights Leader Vernon Jordan
Location: Ft. Wayne, Indiana
Details: Jordan stepped out of his car on the parking lot of his hotel. Joseph Paul Franklin, a white separatist, fired two shots from a Remington model 700 .30-06 rifle from a sniper's lair in a grassy area near the hotel, striking Jordan in the back and right thigh. He was rushed to the hospital, and survived his wounds. Franklin escaped, but was later arrested and indicted on numerous sniper shootings, including Jordan's.
23. Date: June 10, 1980
Target: United Airlines President Percy Wood
Location: Lake Forest, Illinois
Details: A package bomb postmarked Chicago and disguised as the novel "Ice Brothers" exploded when opened by Wood at his home. Wood suffered injuries to his hands, face, and thighs. Weeks before, he had received a letter telling him that he would be receiving a book that all business executives should read. The initials "FC" was found etched on a piece of pipe left from the bomb. It was the fourth bomb in the Unabomber case.
24. Date: December 8, 1980
Target: Musician John Lennon
Location: New York, New York
Details: Mark David Chapman shot Lennon in the back five times with a .38 revolver. Lennon had just arrived home at his apartment and was entering the building. When he had left the building earlier that day, he paused and autographed Chapman's record album. Chapman reportedly considered attacking President Reagan, Hawaii Governor Ariyoshi, Johnny Carson, Elizabeth Taylor, and Senator Edward Kennedy. (Some reports indicate he tried to encounter Johnny Carson at New York's Intercontinental Hotel.)
25. Date: March 30, 1981
Target: President Ronald Reagan
Location: Washington, D.C.
Details: Reagan was attending a function at the Washington Hilton Hote
l. As he emerged from the building and walked toward his limousine, John W. Hinckley Jr. opened fire with a Rohm RG-14 .22 revolver, firing six shots in 1.8 seconds from fifteen feet away. Reagan was wounded in the left side by a bullet, which bounced off the side of his armored limousine. Security personnel overpowered Hinckley. Rapid Secret Service response saved him from greater injury, and immediate transportation to the hospital after the shooting saved him from death. During the attack, a Secret Service agent was wounded in the abdomen, a police officer was struck in the neck, and Reagan's press aide was struck in the forehead. All survived. Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity and placed in a mental hospital. Hinckley had also stalked President Carter at a political rally the previous year, and had considered killing himself at the scene of John Lennon's murder. (3-STARS: Protector action during the attack favorably influenced safety/survival)
26. Date: January 28, 1982
Target: Turkish Consul Kemal Arikan
Location: Los Angeles, California
Details: Two Armenian gunmen assassinated Arikan in his automobile while he was waiting at an intersection. The Armenian extremist group JCAG claimed responsibility. One of the assassins, Hampig Sassounian, was arrested shortly thereafter. Sassounian's accomplice, believed to be Krikor Saliba, escaped to Beirut.
27. Date: March 15, 1982
Target: Actress Theresa Saldana
Location: West Hollywood, California
Details: Arthur Jackson flew from Scotland to America, and spent a year hunting down Saldana. He became obsessed with Saldana after seeing her in the movie Defiance in 1981. He had traveled through several states seeking unsuccessfully to buy a gun, and had to settle on using a knife. Staking out her home, Jackson approached Saldana when she walked to her car, and stabbed her ten times. He was stopped from completing the murder by a passerby named Jeff Fenn, who later became a Sheriff's Deputy. Saldana survived the attack.
28. Date: May 4, 1982
Target: Turkish Consul Arhan Gunduz
Location: Somerville, Massachusetts
Details: A man with a .357 revolver shot Gunduz to death as he was driving home. Gunduz always took the same route home and the gunman waited where Gunduz had to slow down to turn a corner.
29. Date: May 31, 1982
Target: Mayor A. J. Rumely
Location: LaPorte, Indiana
Details: Harold Lang broke into the home of Rumely and shot him and his wife while they slept. She died almost immediately, but the mayor did not pass away until November 25. Lang had been fired a month earlier from his job at the city sewage plant. He was arrested and pleaded "guilty but mentally ill."
30. Date: October 21, 1983
Target: Judge Henry Gentile
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Details: Hutchie Moore, a former policeman confined to a wheelchair, shot and killed Gentile during a divorce property hearing. Moore also killed his wife's attorney. The wife had left the hearing room moments earlier. Moore hid the pistol under a blanket covering his lap. He was arrested.
31. Date: June 18, 1984
Target: Radio Celebrity Alan Berg
Location: Denver, Colorado
Details: Four neo-Nazi gunmen from a group called The Order opened fire with silenced MAC-10 submachine guns, killing him. Berg had arrived home at night and was getting out of his car. The gunmen had signed a declaration of war against the U.S. government and had a hit list that included Henry Kissinger, David Rockefeller, and TV producer/political activist Norman Lear. (In Lear's case, it is believed the group actually surveilled his home.)
32. Date: December 11, 1985
Target: Businessman Hugh Scrutton
Location: Sacramento, California
Details: Scrutton stopped on his way to lunch to remove what looked to be a road hazard in the parking lot behind his computer rental store. The object, actually a bomb filled with nails, exploded. It ripped Scrutton's chest open and penetrated his heart with shrapnel, killing him. It was the eleventh bomb in the Unabomber case.
33. Date: November 18, 1986
Target: District Attorney William Weissich
Location: San Rafael, California
Details: Malcolm Schlette was convicted of arson by DA Weissich in 1955. Schlette vowed revenge. While in prison, Schlette continued to talk about killing the prosecutor. Once out of prison, he continued his threatening comments, which were not reported to Weissich. Schlette also put together an arsenal. He was arrested for violating probation and for violating federal gun laws, but released on probation again. On 11/18/86, Schlette shot and killed Weissich, now in private practice, at his office. Schlette later committed suicide by swallowing poison.
34. Date: July 18, 1989
Target: Actress Rebecca Schaeffer
Location: Los Angeles, California
Details: Robert Bardo had stalked two famous female singers, but was not able to successfully encounter one, and was deterred by security personnel with the second. He became obsessed with Schaeffer and decided to kill her. He obtained a ticket to see her TV show being taped, attended the taping carrying a knife, and sought to encounter her as she drove away from the studio. Unsuccessful, he obtained her home address through a private investigator. Bardo rang the bell at her apartment building, and Schaeffer came to the building door. They spoke briefly, and Bardo left. About a half hour later, he returned, and again, Schaeffer came to the door. This time, Bardo shot her once in the chest with a .357 revolver, killing her. He fled, and was later arrested.
35. Date: December 16, 1989
Target: Federal Judge Robert Vance
Location: Mt. Brook, Alabama
Details: Federal appeals Judge Robert Vance, thinking a fellow judge had sent him some law journals to his home address, opened the package. It exploded, killing him and seriously injuring his wife. Walter LeRoy Moody, the bomber, also mailed three other bombs. One killed a civil rights attorney in Savannah, one was intercepted at the NAACP office in Jacksonville, and the last was intercepted at the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals Courthouse.
36. Date: December 22, 1989
Target: Circuit Judge John Corderman
Location: Hagerstown, Maryland
Details: Corderman was seriously injured in the abdomen and hand while opening a package containing a pipe bomb, which was delivered to his home. The judge was known as strict and often imposed maximum sentences.
37. Date: November 5, 1990
Target: Jewish Leader Meir Kahane
Location: Manhattan, New York
Details: After Kahane made a speech in the Marriott Hotel to supporters he began signing books. Sayyid Nosair, an Arab extremist, rushed to the podium and shot Kahane twice with a .357 revolver. Kahane grabbed his throat as one bullet entered his neck. Nosair fled the scene, shooting a supporter who attempted to stop him. His getaway driver, Mahmud Abouhalima, was supposed to be waiting in his cab outside, but police had ordered him away. Nosair jumped in another cab and pulled away from the hotel, but the driver spotted his gun and stopped. Nosair fled on foot until he encountered U.S. Postal Inspector Carlos Acosta. Seeing Nosair's gun, Acosta drew his own, but was shot in the shoulder by Nosair. Acosta then shot Nosair in the neck. Both Acosta and Nosair survived, but Kahane died. In December 1991, Nosair was acquitted on the murder charge of Kahane in a controversial verdict, but found guilty of gun possession and assaulting Acosta.
38. Date: January 12, 1991
Target: Reverend Al Sharpton
Location: Brooklyn, New York
Details: A man lunged out of a crowd during a protest march and stabbed Sharpton in the chest with a five-inch kitchen knife. Police tackled the man and arrested him. Sharpton was hospitalized.
39. Date: May 5, 1992
Target: District Judge Lawrence Jahnke
Location: Grand Forks, North Dakota
Details: Jahnke was shot and wounded in his courtroom by Ruben Larson, who had been subpoenaed for not paying child support. After being cal
led to testify, Larson pulled a gun as he approached the witness stand. He fired twice, hitting the judge in the abdomen.
40. Date: July 1, 1992
Target: Appellate Judges John Hill and Clyde Ashworth
Location: Ft. Worth, Texas
Details: Attorney George Lott pulled a 9mm pistol and fired on a courtroom, killing two lawyers, one of them the Assistant District Attorney, and wounding two judges. Lott was upset at the custody arrangements for his son. One of the judges in the courtroom had issued the order. He fled the courthouse and later surrendered at a TV station.
41. Date: August 12, 1992
Target: Drug Prosecutor Eric Stonecipher
Location: Riley, Kansas
Details: Stonecipher was driving to a court hearing on a drug case. A gunman, disguised with a ski mask and sitting in the bed of a pickup truck fired five rifle shots as the truck passed Stonecipher's car. He was shot in the arm. Three bullets hit the headrest. One bullet bounced off his prosecutor's badge.
42. Date: March 10, 1993
Target: Dr. David Gunn
Location: Pensacola, Florida
Details: Gunn arrived at the Pensacola Women's Medical Services, where he performed legal abortions. He parked in back of the clinic to avoid the protestors out front. As he got out of his car, Michael Griffin pulled out a revolver, and shot Gunn three times in the back. Gunn was rushed to a hospital, but died in surgery. Griffin surrendered to police and was convicted of murder.
43. Date: June 22, 1993
Target: Dr. Charles Epstein
Location: Tiburon, California
Details: A bomb injured Epstein, a world-renowned geneticist at the University of California, San Francisco, when he opened a package mailed to his home. He suffered a broken arm, severe abdominal injuries, and the loss of several fingers on his right hand. The return address on the package was that of the chairman of the chemistry department at California State University, Sacramento. It was the thirteenth bomb in the Unabomber case.
44. Date: June 24, 1993
Target: Scientist David Gelernter
Location: New Haven, Connecticut
Details: Gelernter lost sight in one eye, hearing in one ear, and part of his right hand when he opened a package bomb mailed to his office. The explosion also wounded him in the chest. The parcel's return address was that of a computer science professor at California State University, Sacramento. Gelernter reportedly dragged himself from his office, down five flights of stairs to the university medical clinic a block away. A few hours later, an anonymous caller phoned the hospital where Gelernter's psychiatrist brother, Joel, worked, warning, "You are next." It was the fourteenth bomb in the Unabomber case.
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