page_title: John Hinckley Jr.
section_title: Obsession with Jodie Foster
hierarchical_section_title: John Hinckley Jr. / Obsession with Jodie Foster
caption_attribution_description: © copyright John Mathew Smith 2001 From November 2 1995 Senator theater Baltimore M.D.
context_page_description: John Warnock Hinckley Jr. is an American who, on March 30, 1981, attempted to assassinate U.S. President Ronald Reagan in Washington, D.C. He wounded Reagan with a bullet from a revolver that ricocheted and hit Reagan in the chest. He also wounded police officer Thomas Delahanty and Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy, and he critically wounded Press Secretary James Brady, who was permanently disabled in the shooting.
  Hinckley was reportedly seeking fame in order to impress actress Jodie Foster, on whom he had an obsessive fixation. He was found not guilty by reason of insanity and remained under institutional psychiatric care until September 10, 2016. Public outcry over the verdict led to the Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984, which altered the rules for consideration of mental illness of defendants in Federal Criminal Court proceedings in the United States.
context_section_description: Hinckley became obsessed with the 1976 film Taxi Driver, in which disturbed protagonist Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) plots to assassinate a presidential candidate. The Bickle character was partly based on the diaries of Arthur Bremer, who attempted to assassinate George Wallace. Hinckley developed an infatuation with Jodie Foster, who played a sexually trafficked 12-year-old child, Iris Steensma, in the film. When Foster entered Yale University, Hinckley moved to New Haven, Connecticut, for a short time to stalk her. There, he slipped poems and messages under Foster's door, and repeatedly called her.
  Failing to develop any meaningful contact with the actress, Hinckley fantasized about conducting an aircraft hijacking or committing suicide in front of her to get her attention. Eventually, he settled on a scheme to impress her by assassinating the president, thinking that by achieving a place in history, he would appeal to her as an equal. Hinckley trailed President Jimmy Carter from state to state, and was arrested in Nashville, Tennessee, on a firearms charge. Penniless, he returned home. Despite psychiatric treatment for depression, his mental health did not improve. He began to target the newly elected president Ronald Reagan in 1981. For this purpose, he collected material on the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
  Hinckley wrote to Foster just before his attempt on Reagan's life:
  Over the past seven months I've left you dozens of poems, letters and love messages in the faint hope that you could develop an interest in me. Although we talked on the phone a couple of times I never had the nerve to simply approach you and introduce myself. ... The reason I'm going ahead with this attempt now is because I cannot wait any longer to impress you. 
  — John Hinckley Jr.
caption: Hinckley became obsessed with Jodie Foster after watching her in Taxi Driver and began stalking her to gain her attention.
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