Members of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Capitol Police security detail had to bang on the door of her Washington, DC apartment to inform her that her husband, Paul Pelosi, had been brutally assaulted on the morning of 28 October.
Ms Pelosi revealed that her bodyguards first rang her doorbell, then when she didn’t answer, banged loudly on the door to her DC residence just past 5.00 am that day.
“So I run to the door and I was very scared — I see the Capitol Police, and they said we have to come in to talk to you," she said, according to an excerpt of an interview with CNN that was released by the network ahead of its 8pm airtime.
The House Speaker said her first thoughts upon seeing the police asking to speak with her were of her children and grandchildren — not her husband.
“I never thought it would be Paul because I knew he wouldn’t be out and about, shall we say,” she explained.
At one point in the interview she has to pause mid-sentence to collect her thoughts before continuing.
Ms Pelosi said the officers who woke her did not know much more about the attack other than it had happened, leaving her with no information on what had happened or what condition her husband was in.
At that time, we didn’t even know where he was or what his condition was," she told CNN. "We just knew there was an assault on him, in our home”.
Mr Pelosi’s alleged assailant, David DePape, has pleaded not guilty to a rash of state and federal charges stemming from the break-in and hammer assault on the 82-year-old investor.
According to court documents, San Francisco Police Department officers who arrived at the Pelosi family townhouse witnessed Mr DePape “wrenched” away a hammer over which he had been struggling with Mr Pelosi, then “lunged” at him before “striking” him in the head “with full force,” knocking him unconscious.
“Mr Pelosi remained unresponsive for about three minutes, waking up in a pool of his own blood,” a court filing from the San Francisco District Attorney’s office stated.
