Paul Pelosi, 82, the husband of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has been hospitalized after an intruder brutally assaulted him with a hammer at his San Francisco home early Friday.
The assailant, identified as David Wayne Depape, 42, of Berkeley, broke into the Pelosi home and yelled, “Where is Nancy?” According to Fox News, a law enforcement officer. The Speaker was in Washington, D.C. at the time.
Mr Depape had “violently assaulted” Mr Pelosi with a hammer before the police arrived.
According to The Associated Press, the 82-year-old man suffered blunt force injuries to his head and body.
Police officers, who were the first responders to the attack and witnessed it, wrestled the hammer from Mr Depape and arrested him in the early hours of Friday. The motive for the attack has yet to be determined.
Early this morning, an assailant broke into the Pelosi residence in San Francisco and violently assaulted Mr Pelosi,” reads a statement by Drew Hammill, the Speaker’s spokesperson, issued on Friday. “The assailant is in custody and the motivation for the attack is under investigation.
Although the speaker was not in town at the time of the attack, the statement disclosed Mr Pelosi had been taken to a health facility, where he was “receiving excellent medical care.”
Reacting to the attack, The White House disclosed that U.S. President Joe Biden “is praying for Paul Pelosi and Speaker Pelosi’s whole family.”
Similarly, Capitol Police said the security unit would assist “the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the San Francisco Police with a joint investigation into a break-in at the California home of the Speaker of the House of Representatives.”