ABC Network - "Reagan Assassination Attempt Coverage" (Part 3, 1981)

Here is some more news coverage from the ABC network, recorded on the day of the President Reagan assassination attempt - 30 years ago today. Includes:

Tape starts in the middle of a report by ABC News' Bettina Gregory in Washington about Presidential would-be assassin John W. Hinckley, Jr. and the events leading up to the shooting; she explains the Secret Service had no knowledge of a prior arrest of Hinckley in Nashville.

Back to Anchor Frank Reynolds in the studio, who starts off saying, "Yes, that of course is the kind of information we would like to have in a computer, but if people are not going to be checked standing around outside the hotel where the President's going to come out, it's hard to know whether they would have been able to identify him, although the agents are of course trained to be on the lookout for people who have been flagged to them, so to speak, as potential threats to the President." He then mentions that Hinckley was taken from the jail to the courthouse to be arraigned on the charges (with a brief video clip of cars traveling).

Reynolds next introduces a report from Evergreen, CO (Hinckley's home base) by Steven Geer, who reports on efforts to piece together the motive for Hinckley's actions (tape cuts out in middle of his report)

We then cut to the middle of a report by Tom Jarriel about the usual layout of Secret Service detail whenever the President is at public events, with a clip of the 1977 inaugural parade for Jimmy Carter; Jarriel explains the history of how the Secret Service came to protect the President, with reference to the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln (in 1865), James Garfield (in 1881), William McKinley (in 1901), and John F. Kennedy (in 1963); it was mentioned that Kennedy insisted on riding in an open car over Secret Service objections on the day of his assassination. A clip of the Zapruder film is shown, and an interview with Agent Rufus Youngblood (who was on duty on Nov. 22, 1963) is also presented; Youngblood gives a detailed description of the events that happened. Jarriel then mentions that Robert Kennedy's 1968 assassination led to further change in Secret Service protocol for protecting the President, Vice President, and all Presidential candidates (another interview with ??). We next see Jarriel on the field witnessing one of the Secret Service training sessions, which ends the report.

Reynolds, at the studio, thanks Jarriel for the report; he advises that more info on Secret Service protection of the President will be on that night's edition of ABC News Nightline, before the tape cuts out.

This aired on local Chicago TV on Monday, March 30th 1981.

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