Leslie Coffelt - Aftermath

Aftermath

President Truman wrote in a letter a short time later:

I'm sorry I didn’t get to talk to you and (cousin) Nellie at the dinner or after it. But I'm really a prisoner now.
...The grand guards who were hurt in the attempt on me didn't have a fair chance. The one who was killed was just cold bloodedly murdered before he could do anything. But his assassin did not live but a couple of minutes – one of the S.S. (Secret Service) men put a bullet in one ear and it came out the other...
The S.S. chief said to me, "Mr. President, don't you know that when there's an Air Raid Alarm you don't run out and look up, you go for cover." I saw the point but it was over then.
Hope it won't happen again. They won't let me go walking or even cross the street on foot. I say 'they' won't, but it causes them so much anguish that I conform ... But I want no more guards killed. - Letter from Truman to his cousin, Ethel Noland, dated November 17, 1950

Coffelt's widow, Cressie E. Coffelt, was later asked by the President and the Secretary of State to go to Puerto Rico, to accept the condolences and expressions of sorrow for her husband's death from various Puerto Rican leaders and crowds. Mrs. Coffelt made a speech acknowledging that the island's people were not responsible for the acts of Collazo and Torresola.

Oscar Collazo was convicted and sentenced to death in federal court; Truman commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. Acknowledging the importance of the question of Puerto Rican independence, Truman allowed a plebiscite in Puerto Rico in 1952 to determine the status of its relationship to the U.S. The people voted to continue as a Free Associated State, as established in 1950.

Private Coffelt was buried in Arlington National Cemetery on November 4, 1950 in Section 17, Site 17719-59. His epitaph reads, "White House Policeman: Who Gave His Life in Defense of the President of the United States During an Assassination Attempt at the Blair House, Washington, D.C." To this day, Coffelt is one of only four Secret Service members to take a bullet while defending the President, the others being Donald Birdzell and Joseph Downs, wounded during the same incident, and Tim McCarthy. McCarthy was wounded in the abdomen by John Hinckley, Jr. during the Ronald Reagan assassination attempt.

A plaque at the Blair House commemorates Coffelt's sacrifice, heroism, and fidelity to his duty and his country. The day room for the U.S. Secret Service's Uniformed Division at the Blair House is named for Coffelt as well.

In 1979, President Jimmy Carter commuted Collazo's sentence to time served, and granted the man release. Collazo returned to Puerto Rico, where he died in 1994.