Paul Pelosi Attacker Regrets Not Getting 'More of Them' in Ominous Call
In an alarming phone call to a California newsroom on Friday, David DePape, the alleged attacker of Paul Pelosi, said that he was "sorry [he] didn't get more of them."
DePape, a 42-year-old Canadian citizen living in the San Francisco area, was arrested in late October after breaking into Pelosi's home in the Pacific Heights neighborhood and assaulting him with a hammer. DePape reportedly said at the scene that he was looking for Pelosi's wife, California congresswoman and then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who was in Washington, D.C., at the time of the violent assault.
Pelosi survived the incident, but was severely injured and required surgery for a fractured skull. DePape faces two federal charges for the attempted kidnapping of a federal official and assault of an immediate family member of a federal official, as well as six other state-level charges.
On Friday, DePape called into the newsroom of KTVU, a news station serving California's Bay Area, from the San Francisco County Jail, responding to an earlier call from journalist Amber Lee.
In the phone call, DePape expressed seemingly no remorse over the injuries he dealt to Pelosi, and in fact, seemed upset that he could not have done more. He also ominously claimed to have obtained the "names and addresses" of people, like Nancy Pelosi, whom he claimed are attacking individual liberties in the country.
"I got their names and addresses so I could pay them a little visit... have a heart-to-heart chat about their bad behavior," DePape said during the call. "I want to apologize to everyone. I messed up. What I did was really bad. I'm so sorry I didn't get more of them. It's my own fault. No one else is to blame. I should have come better prepared."
DePape has, so far, pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. His next court date is scheduled for February 23.
Further investigations into DePape's background since the assault in October have revealed a predilection for right-wing conspiracy theories, both fringe and mainstream.
Across several online forums, he expressed the beliefs that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump through fraud, that Jewish people had orchestrated the war in Ukraine, and that climate change is a hoax, as well as general skepticism over COVID-19 vaccines and masks. He also on several occasions shared ideas associated with QAnon, a far-right movement tied to numerous conspiracy theories.
Newsweek reached out to DePape's public defender for comment.
