The Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that on Saturday that her husband was improving in a hospital, but that the attack on him by an intruder in the couple’s home in California left her and her family “heartbroken and traumatized”.
Pelosi, D-Calif., updated house members on the chilling incident in a letter to House colleagues that represented her first public remarks about the violence that occurred early Friday.
The spokeswoman said she was grateful for the police and doctor’s quick response to a 911 call from her husband, who she called ‘Pop’.
“Yesterday morning, a violent man entered our family home, asked to confront me and brutally attacked my husband Paul,” she wrote in the letter. “Our children, grandchildren and I are heartbroken and traumatized by the life threatening attack on our Pop.”
San Francisco police said David DePape, 42, who is facing charges including attempted murder, entered the home occupied at the time only by Paul Pelosi and confronted him, ending in a shooting. war on hammer.
The officers who entered the house saw the two locked in that battle and told them to drop the weapon, said the police. As Pelosi released his grip, the suspect grabbed her and then hit Pelosi in the head, they said.
Pelosi, 82, was rushed to Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, where he “underwent successful surgery to repair a fractured skull and serious injuries to his right arm and hand,” Nancy Pelosi’s office said in a statement Friday.
In the letter, Pelosi said, “The outpouring of prayers and warm wishes from so many in Congress is comforting to our family and is helping Paul make progress in his recovery.”
“His condition continues to improve,” she added.
Two sources told NBC News that the intruder was looking for the speaker, who was in Washington, D.C. Her US Capitol Police security detail is assigned to Pelosi and not to family members or permanent locations such as her primary residence in San Francisco.
The sources, one of whom is a senior US official, said that before the attack took place, the intruder confronted Paul Pelosi shouting, “Where’s Nancy, where’s Nancy?”
The attack, whose motive remains under investigation, occurred within two months of warnings from legislators that political violence was likely in the weeks and days before the mid-term elections of ‘ November.
A family member who was traveling with Pelosi as she returned to California on Saturday said the DePape suspect brought a hammer and broke windows overlooking the property’s backyard before confronting Paul Pelosi.
The suspect allegedly tried to tie up Paul Pelosi, saying they would wait for the speaker’s return, the family member said. Paul seized a moment of inattention from the attacker to call 911, police said.
San Francisco Police Department Chief Bill Scott indicated he wasn’t spoken to much, if at all, during the 911 call made by Paul Pelosi on Friday, but he praised an eager dispatcher for sensing there was serious emergency.
Calls to 911 without content, such as hangups and open lines, are usually dispatched as low-priority well-being checks, Scott said during an interview Saturday. Often, these involve children playing with the phone or accidental calls.
Dispatch Heather Grives had pushed the Pelosi 911 call Friday as a priority, and officers Colby Willness and Kyle Cagney and Sgt. Edmund Hoeing arrived within three minutes, he said.
“Her actions, in my opinion resulted in both a higher priority dispatch and a faster police response,” he said. “I think that would have been a life saver.”
Dennis Romero is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital.