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Sara Jane Moore, 77, Released on Parole; Tried to Shoot Gerald Ford
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
Bloomberg - Dec 31, 2007
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=afEPYE__FG9c&refer=us
Sara Jane Moore, Would-Be Ford Assassin, Is Freed, CNN Re****ts
By Nancy Moran
Dec. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Sara Jane Moore, one of two women who tried to
assassinate former President Gerald Ford in 1975, was released from a
federal prison in California today, CNN re****ted, citing the U.S.
Bureau of Prisons.
Moore, 77, was freed from a women's prison in Dublin, California, this
morning, CNN said.
She had been sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to
attempted assassination, the cable-television channel re****ted. She
fired a .38-caliber revolver at Ford outside San Francisco's St.
Francis Hotel on Sept. 22, 1975, CNN said.
A bystander was credited with grabbing Moore's arm and saving the late
president's life by inches, CNN said. It was the second attempt on
Ford's life in 17 days; the first was by Lynette ``Squeaky'' Fromme in
Sacramento, CNN said.
It wasn't known why Moore was released on parole at this time nor where
she went after being freed, CNN said.
***
AP via the LA Times - Dec 31, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ford1jan01,1,5480785.story?coll=la-headlines-california
President Ford's would-be assassin released from prison
Associated Press
Sara Jane Moore, shown here in a photo from 1975, said she was blinded
by her radical political views at the time, convinced that the
government had declared war on the left. Sara Jane Moore is out on
parole after being in federal prison since 1976. By Richard Winton and
Larry Gordon, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers January 1, 2008 Sara Jane
Moore, who tried to assassinate President Gerald R. Ford in 1975, was
released from federal prison in the Bay Area early today after serving
more than three decades behind bars, officials said.
Moore, 77, who has been in jail since 1976, was released this morning
from the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, a low-security
facility for women near San Francisco, said Mike Truman a spokesman
with the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Moore remains on parole.
Moore, an accountant and a divorced mother of four, fired at Ford on
Sept. 22, 1975, as the president was leaving a speaking engagement at
the St. Francis Hotel in downtown San Francisco. Her single shot from
a .38 caliber revolver missed after Oliver Sipple, a disabled Vietnam
War veteran, grabbed her arm and pulled her down.
Federal public defenders were preparing an insanity defense for Moore,
who had received psychiatric treatment several times in the past, but
she pleaded guilty over her lawyer's objections. After she was
sentenced to life in prison, Moore expressed mixed feelings about her
actions.
"Am I sorry I tried?" she said. "Yes and no. Yes, because it
accomplished little except to throw away the rest of my life ... And,
no, I'm not sorry I tried, because at the time it seemed a correct
expression of my anger."
James Hewitt, the now-retired federal public defender who handled
Moore's case, said the public should not be alarmed by her release from
prison.
"She is pretty close to becoming an old lady," Hewitt, who lives in
Marin County, said in a telephone interview today. "She is probably too
old to cause any damage."
Besides, he stressed, her cause in trying to shoot Ford was political,
even if it was a jumbled political goal, and he says she does not pose
a general threat to society. Describing Moore as "a very confused
person," Hewitt said he never got a clear sense of her motives. "I'm
not sure anybody knows why she did it," he said.
"This is a strange woman. Let's hope she has gotten over her
strangeness," he said. "I think she has had a lot of time to think
about it."
The former public defender, now 78, said he has had no contact with
Moore for more than 30 years and that he knows that Moore blamed him
for her sentence. "Hopefully, she won't be contacting me now," he said.
Moore's attempt on Ford's life came 17 days after Lynette Alice
"Squeaky" Fromme tried to kill Ford on Sept. 5, 1975, when she burst
through a crowd at the state Capitol, dressed in a nun's robe with
a .45 caliber pistol strapped to her leg.
Fromme pointed the weapon at Ford from 2 feet away. Though it was
loaded, there was no bullet in the firing chamber. A Secret Service
agent disarmed her and slapped her in handcuffs.
Ford died on Dec. 26, 2006, of natural causes.
*
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