Francisco Martin Duran
On October 29, 1994 (18 years ago today) Francisco Martin Duran fired 29 rounds from an SKS rifle at the White House. He was later convicted of attempting to assassinate United States President Bill Clinton and sentenced to 40 years in prison.
It was on a Saturday, October 29, 1994, that Duran dressed in a trench coat, went up to the fence overlooking the north lawn of the White House and fired a 7.62x39mm SKS semi-automatic rifle at a group of men in dark business suits on the White House lawn. At first it was believed that one of the men was President Clinton, but this turned out not to be the case. Secret Service officers immediately began running across the lawn, guns drawn. When Duran tried to reload, three citizens Harry Rakosky, Ken Davis, and Robert Haines tackled Duran and pinned his arms until he could be subdued. Fortunately no one was harmed in the assassination attempt.
Clinton was reportedly inside watching a football game at the time of the shooting and was unharmed. The incident followed just six weeks after Frank Eugene Corder crashed a Cessna into the White House south lawn and prompted debate about closing off traffic on that area of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Duran plead not guilty and raised an insanity defense, claiming that he was trying to save the world by destroying an alien "mist," connected by an umbilical cord to an alien in the Colorado mountains. Prosecutors told the jury that Duran was faking insanity, and called more than 60 witnesses to testify that Duran hated government in general, and President Clinton in particular. The jury deliberated for under five hours to reject the insanity defense and arrive at the guilty verdict.
Duran is currently serving his sentence at the medium-security Federal Correctional Institution at Florence Federal Correctional Complex in Florence, Colorado. The Bureau of Prisons projects his release date to be the year 2029.
Here is a youtube video of Duran firing the shots and being subdued:
It was on a Saturday, October 29, 1994, that Duran dressed in a trench coat, went up to the fence overlooking the north lawn of the White House and fired a 7.62x39mm SKS semi-automatic rifle at a group of men in dark business suits on the White House lawn. At first it was believed that one of the men was President Clinton, but this turned out not to be the case. Secret Service officers immediately began running across the lawn, guns drawn. When Duran tried to reload, three citizens Harry Rakosky, Ken Davis, and Robert Haines tackled Duran and pinned his arms until he could be subdued. Fortunately no one was harmed in the assassination attempt.
Clinton was reportedly inside watching a football game at the time of the shooting and was unharmed. The incident followed just six weeks after Frank Eugene Corder crashed a Cessna into the White House south lawn and prompted debate about closing off traffic on that area of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Duran plead not guilty and raised an insanity defense, claiming that he was trying to save the world by destroying an alien "mist," connected by an umbilical cord to an alien in the Colorado mountains. Prosecutors told the jury that Duran was faking insanity, and called more than 60 witnesses to testify that Duran hated government in general, and President Clinton in particular. The jury deliberated for under five hours to reject the insanity defense and arrive at the guilty verdict.
Duran is currently serving his sentence at the medium-security Federal Correctional Institution at Florence Federal Correctional Complex in Florence, Colorado. The Bureau of Prisons projects his release date to be the year 2029.
Here is a youtube video of Duran firing the shots and being subdued: