The wife of Virginia gunman James Hodgkinson who targeted a Republican party baseball practice match on Wednesday and critically injured GOP congressman Steve Scalise has spoken publicly for the first time about the shooting, telling reporters: “I can’t believe he did this.”
At an emotional press conference outside the couple’s home in Belleville, Illinois, Sue Hodgkinson struggled for words to describe events running up to the shooting and said her husband, known also as Tom, had told her he had gone to the nation’s capital to “work on taxes”.
“I had no idea this was going to happen and I don’t know what to say about it,” she said, flanked by St Clair county chief deputy Richard Wagner. “I can’t wrap my head around it.”
Sue Hodgkinson said her husband left the couple’s home in March to move to Washington, shortly after their adopted daughter moved back into the house with her two-year-old son.
“[James] was home all day long and he just wanted a break,” she said, adding that she did not know if he had taken any weapons with him as he left. It was not immediately clear if she thought her husband’s move was temporary.
Hodgkinson, who had been married to her husband for almost 30 years, said he had “made preparations to leave” by “selling almost everything he owned from his business”.
James Hodgkinson, 66, a former home-inspection businessman, had been charged with domestic violence in 2006 but was not convicted and had a number of minor convictions on his record. He had also posted inflammatory messages opposing the presidency of Donald Trump and articulated support for Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.
Asked if she had a message for any of the four people injured in the attack, Sue Hodgkinson said: “I don’t even know who was shot. I’m sorry that he did this but there is nothing I can do about it.”
Her husband opened fire on the baseball practice session in Alexandria, Virginia, early on Wednesday morning. Scalise, the house majority whip, remains in a critical condition. Three others, a GOP congressional aide, a US capitol police officer and a lobbyist were also injured by gunfire. Hodgkinson was transferred to hospital and died of his injuries shortly after.
Dozens of reporters have been stationed outside Hodgkinson’s two-storey house on the outskirts of Belleville since he was first named in media reports on Wednesday morning.
Sue Hodgkinson said she was informed of her husband’s involvement when a reporter from ABC news called just hours after the attack. She declined to answer questions about her husband’s political views.
Before Hodgkinson emerged from a black SUV that had been parked outside the family home for much of the afternoon, Wagner, the sheriff’s deputy, said, “She wants this to end ... she’s scared to death.”