Congresswoman meeting with voters among 13 wounded in Arizona

TUCSON, Ariz. -- U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot in the head Saturday by a gunman who opened fire outside a grocery store while she met with voters, killing a federal judge and five others in a rampage that left Americans questioning whether divisive politics had pushed the suspect over the edge.

The shooting targeted Giffords and left the three-term congresswoman in critical condition after a bullet passed through her brain.

Giffords, 40, is a moderate Democrat who narrowly won re-election in November against a Tea Party candidate who sought to oust her from office over her support of the health care law.

Anger over Giffords' position became violent at times, with her Tucson office vandalized after the House passed the overhaul last March and someone showing up at a recent gathering with a weapon.

Police say the shooter was in custody and was identified as Jared Loughner, 22.

It's still not clear if Loughner had the health care debate in mind or was focused on his own unusual set of political beliefs, many outlined in rambling videos and postings on the Internet.

Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik described the gunman as mentally unstable and possibly acting with an accomplice.

Dupnik said Giffords was among 13 people wounded in the melee that killed six people, including 9-year-old Christina Greene and U.S. District Judge John Roll, 63, who had stopped by to see his friend Giffords after attending Mass like he does every day.

The sheriff's office said the others who were killed were 76-year-old Dorthy Murray, 76-year-old Dorwin Stoddard, 79-year-old Phyllis Scheck and 30-year-old Gabe Zimmerman, an aide to the congresswoman.

Dupnik said the rampage ended only after two people tackled the gunman.

The sheriff blamed the vitriolic political rhetoric that has consumed the country .

"When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government. The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous," Dupnik said. "And unfortunately, Arizona, I think, has become the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry."

Giffords expressed similar concern, even before the shooting. After her office was vandalized, she referred to the animosity against her by conservatives, including Sarah Palin's decision to list Giffords' seat as one of the top targets in the midterm elections.

During his campaign effort to unseat Giffords in November, Republican challenger Jesse Kelly held fundraisers where he urged supporters to help remove Giffords from office by joining him to shoot a fully loaded M-16 rifle.

Kelly is a former Marine who served in Iraq and was pictured on his website in military gear holding his automatic weapon and promoting the event.

"I don't see the connection," between the fundraisers featuring weapons and Saturday's shooting, said John Ellinwood, Kelly's spokesman.

"I don't know this person, we cannot find any records that he was associated with the campaign in any way. I just don't see the connection. Arizona is a state where people are firearms owners. This was just a deranged individual."

Law enforcement officials said members of Congress reported 42 cases of threats or violence in the first three months of 2010, nearly three times the 15 cases reported during the same period a year earlier.

Nearly all the threats and violent actions dealt with the health care bill, and Giffords was among the targets.

In Washington, politicians of all stripes denounced the attack as horrific. Capitol police asked members of Congress to be more vigilant about security in the wake of the shooting.

Giffords, known as "Gabby," tweeted shortly before the shooting, describing her "Congress on Your Corner" event: "My 1st Congress on Your Corner starts now. Please stop by to let me know what is on your mind or tweet me later."

President Barack Obama called the attack "a tragedy for our entire country."

"It's not surprising that today Gabby was doing what she always does, listening to the hopes and concerns of her neighbors," Obama said. "That is the essence of what our democracy is about."

Mark Kimball, a communications staffer for Giffords, described the scene as "just complete chaos, people screaming, crying."

The gunman fired at Giffords and her district director and started shooting indiscriminately at staffers and others standing in line to talk to the congresswoman, Kimball said.

"He was not more than three or four feet from the congresswoman and the district director," Kimball said.

Doctors were optimistic about Giffords surviving as she was responding to commands from doctors.

"With guarded optimism, I hope she will survive, but this is a very devastating wound," said Dr. Richard Carmona, the former surgeon general who lives in Tucson.

Giffords spokesman C.J. Karamargin said three Giffords staffers were shot. Two are expected to survive. But Gabe Zimmerman, a former social worker who was Giffords' director of community outreach, died.

Giffords had worked with the judge who was killed to line up funding to build a new courthouse in Yuma, and Obama hailed him for his nearly 40 years of service.

Greg Segalini, an uncle of the 9-year-old victim, said a neighbor was going to the event and invited her along because she had been elected to the student council and was interested in government.

Christina Greene, who was born on Sept. 11, 2001, was involved in activities from ballet to baseball. She had just received her first Holy Communion at St. Odilia's Catholic Church, officials at the Catholic Diocese of Tucson said.

A former classmate described Loughner as a pot-smoking loner. Army officials said he tried to enlist in December 2008 but was rejected for reasons they would not disclose.

Federal law enforcement officials were poring over versions of a MySpace page that included a mysterious "Goodbye friends" message published hours before the shooting and exhorted his friends to "Please don't be mad at me."

In Loughner's middle-class neighborhood, about a five-minute drive from the shooting scene, sheriff's deputies had much of the street blocked off. The neighborhood sits just off a busy Tucson street and is lined with desert land­scaping and palm trees.

Neighbors said Loughner lived with his parents and kept to himself. He was often seen walking his dog, almost always wearing a hooded sweatshirt and listening to his iPod.

Loughner's MySpace profile indicates he attended and graduated from school in Tucson and had taken college classes. He did not say if he was employed.

"We're getting out of here. We are freaked out," said 33-year-old David Cleveland, who lives a few doors down from Loughner's house.

Cleveland said he was taking his wife and children, ages 5 and 7, to her parent's home when they heard about the shooting. "When we heard about it, we just got sick to our stomachs," Cleveland said. "We just wanted to hold our kids tight."

Giffords was first elected to Congress amid a wave of Democratic victories in the 2006 election.

She is married to astronaut Mark E. Kelly, who has piloted space shuttles Endeavour and Discovery. The two met in China in 2003 while they were on a committee there, and were married in January 2007.

Sen. Bill Nelson, chairman of the Senate Commerce Space and Science Subcommittee, said Kelly is training to be the next commander of the space shuttle mission slated for April. His brother is serving aboard the International Space Station, Nelson said.