Assassinations
Attempted
1800, French Emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte
1800, King of the UK,George III
Assassinated
All statistics are based on a list of 187 events involving an attempt
or assassination, spanning from 227 bce to 2012.
1800
Some started wars while others failed so miserably
they weren’t made public until years later
1810
An assassination is defined as when a person of interest
is murdered. If a person wasn’t well-known, it would just
be a murder. The assassins may be paid to kill but all
of the attempts in this project are executed by people
who believe that “positive” change will happen if the
victim is killed. They may have feelings of revenge or
the need for justice. Politically, an assassination can
cause a shift in power. Having an opinion and/or power
made it so you had to look over your shoulder.
Spencer Perceval, 1st and only United Kingdom Prime Minister to be assassinated, 1812
Map of Major Attempts
& Assassinations
1820
Europe
42%
Reasons Why
1830
Political Act
Betrayal, Revenge, Hate
1835, First attempt to kill a U.S. President, Andrew Jackson
Delusional, fanatic
1840
religion
1842, Former Missouri Governer, Lilburn Boggs
North America
18%
Political Act Reasons
Misc.
Asia
29%
Africa
9%
attention, power
1850
Independence
South America
2%
1853, Emperor of Austria, Franz Joseph I
Nationalism
anarchy
communism
1861, U.S. President, Abraham Lincoln
activism
1860
1863, U.S. President, Abraham Lincoln
Status of Assassin(s)
Abraham Lincoln, 1st sitting assassination of a President, 1865
Thomas D’Arcy McGee, Canadian Parliament, 1867
unknown
known
United States Presidency Events
1870
Andrew Jackson
Failed
1835
Gabriel Garcia Moreno, Ecuadorian President, 1875
Amount of Assassins
1878, King of Italy, Umberto I
2 killers
1880
Abraham Lincoln
2 Failed attempts,
2 and 4 years before
his 1865 assassination
Alexander II, Tsar of Russia, 1881
group
1 killer
1891, Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II
William McKinley
Assassinated
1901
1890
Theodore Roosevelt
Failed
1912
Sadi Carnot, French President, 1894
Aftermath for the Assassin
1900
institutionalized
Mlimo, Ndebele Religious Leader, 1894
Naser al-Din Shah Qajar, King, 1896
Antonio Canovas del Castillo, Spanish Prime Minister, 1897
Elisabeth, Empress of Austria, 1898
William Goebel, Gov. of Kentucky, 1900
Umberto I, King of Italy, 1900
Harry S. Truman
Failed
1950
John F. Kennedy
1 Failed attempt 3 years
before his 1963 assassination
William McKinley, U.S. President, 1901
suicide
Nikolai Ivanovich Bobrikov, General of Finland, 1904
Frank Steunenberg, Former Idaho Gov., 1905
1906, King and Queen of Spain, Alfonso XIII and Victoria Eugenie
shot
Carlos I & Luis Filipe, King of Portugal and his heir, 1908
executed
1910
prison
1912, U.S. President, Theodore Roosevelt
Type of Execution
George I, King of Greece, 1913
Franz Ferdinand, the start of WWI, Archduke of Austria, 1914
Jean Juares, French socialist leader, 1914
Kitchener, Lord, 1916
1918, Vladimir Lenin
1920
garrote
electric chair
Richard Nixon
Failed
1974
Gabriel Narutowics, 1st Polish President, 1922
Gerald Ford
2 Failed attempts within
2 weeks of each other,
both by females
1975
1926, Benito Mussolini
firing squad
1928, Herbert Hoover
hanging
1930
Paul Doumer, French President, 1932
Anton Cermak, 1933
Engelbert Dollfuss, Austrian Chancellor, 1934
Huey Long, U.S. Senator, 1935
1936, King of the UK, Edward VIII
Weapons Used Before The 1st
Gun Assassination
George Wallace
Failed attempt on canidate
1972
Emiliano Zapata, 1919
Michael Collins, 1922
Pancho Villa, 1923
guillotine
Robert F. Kennedy
Assassinated the night of his
democratic nomination announcement
1968
Itoh Hirobumi, Prime Minister of Japan, 1909
1941, King of Italy, Victor Emmanuel III
1942, German ambassador, Franz von Papen
1943, Philippine President, Jose P. Laurel
1944, Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler
Male vs. Female
torture
1940
Lev Bronstein Trotsky, killed by ice axe, 1940
Jimmy Carter
Failed
1979
Alexander I, King of Yugoslavia, 1934
Ronald Reagan
Failed
1981
Michael O’Dwyer, 1940
Reinhard Heydrich, SS Leader, 1942
George H.W. Bush
Failed
1993
Franz Kutschera, SS Leader, 1944
female
assassin
Male
strangulation
Mahatma Gandhi, 1948
poison
1950, U.S. President, Harry S. Truman
1950
knife
Bill Clinton
3 Failed attempts,
only one of which
was legitimate,
an attempt by
Osama Bin Laden
1994(2x), 1996
Raid Al Solh, Prime Minister of Lebanon, 1951
Abdullah bin Hussein, King of Jordan, 1952
target
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
1958, Martin Luther King, Jr.
1960, Fidel Castro
1962, French President, Charles de Gaulle
Weapons Used After The 1st
Gun Assassination
1960, U.S. President elect, John F. Kennedy
1960
1962, President of Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem
1963, Robert Mcnamara and Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.
1963, Political activist, Edwin Walker
John F. Kennedy, U.S. President, 1963
1969, Soviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev
1970, Vice Prime Minister, Chiang Ching-kuo
Asphyxiation
1970
1972, U.S. Presidential canidate, Geroge Wallace
1974, U.S. President, Richard Nixon
Poison
1979, U.S. President, Jimmy Carter
Torture/Hacking
1979, Nato Commander, Alexander Haig
1981, Pope John Paul II
1981, U.S. president, Ronald Reagan
1982, Pope John Paul II
Knife
1980
1984, British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher
Bomb
Age of the Assassinated
7/128 of the people recorded died at the age of 49
1990, German Federal Minister of Interior, Wolfgang Schauble
1991, British Prime Minister, John Major
1993, U.S. President, George H.W. Bush
1994, U.S. President, Bill Clinton
1994, U.S. President, Bill Clinton
1995, Pope, John Paul II
1996, U.S. President, Bill Clinton
1999, George Harrison
6
2001, U.S. President, George W. Bush
5
4
2001, U.S. President, George W. Bush
2002, French President, Jacques Chriac
2004, President of Republic of China, Chen Shui-bian
2005, U.S. President and Georgian President, George W. Bush and Mikheil Saakashvili
3
2
2009, President of Guinea, Moussa Dadis Camara
2009, Queen of the Netherlands, Beatrix
2010, Missouri Governor, Jay Nixon
1
20
26
31 35
39
43
47 50 53
56
59
62
65
68
71
74 76 78
Martin Luther King, Jr., 1968
Robert F. Kennedy, U.S. Senator, 1968
Pierre Laporte, Vice Premier of Quebec, 1972
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, 1st Bangladeshi President, 1975
Faisal, Saudi King, 1975
Orlando Letelier, 1976
Siegfried Buback, German Prosecutor, 1977
George Moscone and Harvey Milk, SF Mayor and Supervisor, 1978
Leo Ryan, California Congressman, 1978
Louis, 1st Earl of Mountbatten of Burma, 1979
Park Chung-hee, South Korean President, 1979
John Lennon, 1980
Anwar Al Sadat, Egyptian President, 1981
Ziaur Rahman, Bangladeshi President, 1981
Bachir Gemayel, Lebanese President, 1982
Ninoy Aquino, Philippine Senator, 1983
Indria Gandhi, Indian Prime Minister, 1984
Aldo Moro, Former Itailian Prime Minister, 1978
Olof Palme, Swedish Prime Minister, 1986
Gun
7
Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam, 1963
Luis Carrero Blanco, President of Spain , 1973
1975, U.S. President, Gerald Ford
1975, U.S. President, Gerald Ford
Automobile
Lee Harvey Oswald, believed to have shot JFK, 1963
Malcolm X, tension from the Nation of Islam, 1965
Hendrick Verwoerd, Prime Minister of South Africa, 1966
George Lincoln Rockwell, American Nazi Pary founder, 1967
1967, American Nazi Pary founder, George Lincoln Rockwell
1968, German leader, Rudi Dutschke
Ice Axe
George W. Bush
2 Failed Attempts
in 2001, 1 in 2005
Solomon Bandaranaike, Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, 1959
Inejiro Asanuma, 1960
Medgar Evers, NAACP leader killed by KKK, 1962
2011, Former Norwegian Prime Minister, Gro Harlem Brundtland
2011, Gabrielle Giffords
2012, Indian General, Kuldip Singh Brar
1990
2000
Anton Lubowski, Namibian Lawyer, 1989
John Major, British Prime Minister, 1991
Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo, Cardinal, 1993
Chris Hani, Southern African Communist leader, 1993
Luis Donaldo Colosio, Mexican Candidate, 1994
Juvenal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira, Rwandan President and Burundian President, 1994
Yitzhak Rabin, Israeli Prime Minister, 1995
Ranasinghe Premadasa, Sri Lankan President, 1993
Tommy Burks, Tennessee State Senator, 1998
Vazgen Sargsyan and Karen Demirchyan, Armenian Prime Minister and Speaker, 1999
Fernando Buesa, Basque Parlament member, 2000
Birendra, King of Nebal, 2001
Pim Fortuyn, Dutch Candidate, 2002
Anna Lindh, Swedish Foreign Minister, 2003
Zoran Dindic, Serbian Prime Minister, 2003
Akhmad Kadyrov, President of Chechnya, 2004
Theo van Gogh, great-great-nephew of the painter, 2004
Rafik Hariri, Former Lebanese Prime Minister, 2005
Anna Politkovskay, Journalist, 2006
Alexander Litvinenko, posioned with radiation, Former FSB officer, 2006
Hrant Dink, Turkish journalist, 2007
Benazir Bhutto, Former Prime Minister of Pakistan, 2007
Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, Hamas Military commander, 2010
Eugene Terre Blanche, 2010
Shahbaz Bhatti, Federal Minister for Minorities of Pakistan, 2011
Salmaan Taseer, 26th Governor of Punjab, 2011
Abdul Fatah Younis, Libyan Republic Commander, 2011
Burhanuddin Rabbani, Former Afghan President, 2011
J. Christopher Stevens, U.S. Ambassador to Libya, 2012
Dawoud Rajiha, Asef Shawkat, Hasan Turkmani and Hisham Ikhtiyar, Syrai’s Defense Members, 2012
Madeleine Lucero-Simmons
Information Design
Sources:
“How to Kill” by Kris Hollington
Wikipedia