Nancy Pelosi pleads for 'very long' prison sentence for husband's hammer attacker
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is asking a court to impose a "very long" sentence of the conspiracy theorist who broke into her home and brutally attacked her elderly husband.
The former House speaker's husband Paul Pelosi says he still suffers from dizziness, headaches, balance problems, nerve pain and walking challenges after David DePape attacked him with a hammer in October 2022, just before the midterm elections, reported CBS News.
"A violent man broke into our home, threatened to kidnap me and – in his own words – made my husband Paul 'take the punishment' in my absence with a near-fatal attack with a hammer," the veteran lawmaker wrote to the court. "Paul and I 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."
Her chief of staff Terri McCollough wrote a separate letter reminded the sentencing judge that rioters had broken into the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and many of them can be heard chanting, "Where's Nancy?" as they sought to prevent the certification of Joe Biden's election win over Donald Trump.
ALSO READ: Federal Election Commission kills anonymous donor proposal
"We could not imagine anything worse could happen in our world," McCullough wrote. "Yet I did, because of this defendant's actions. 'Where's Nancy?' he asked. After the brutal attack of Mr. Pelosi in October 2022, we knew the Speaker and her family were not safe in their own homes."
The Justice Department is seeking 40 years in prison for Depape, 44, who was convicted late last year on charges of attempted kidnapping of a federal official and assault on the immediate family member of a federal official.
DePape testified during his trial that he broke into the couple's San Francisco home intending to hold the then-speaker hostage and "break her kneecaps" if she lied to him, and he admitted to bludgeoning her husband with the hammer after police arrived.