Line of fire: Manhattan Beach native says Tucson shot to his shoulder felt like a sledge hammer
Mira Costa graduate Jim Tucker was among the shooting victims visited by President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at the University of Arizona’s McKale Memorial Center in Tucson, Ariz. On Jan. 12, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) One moment Manhattan Beach native Jim Tucker was shaking hands with U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords at a meet-and-greet outside a Tucson, Arizona supermarket. The next moment, both lay bleeding on the ground. Tucker, a Mira Costa High School graduate, had been third in line to meet Giffords at her Jan. 8 “Congress on Your Corner” event at a Safeway store. He and his wife Doris had just begun speaking with the congresswoman when a gunman unleashed a barrage of bullets from only two or three feet away, striking Giffords in the head, wounding Tucker in the right leg and shoulder, killing six other people, and wounding 11 more. “There was no notice whatsoever,” Tucker said in an interview from his Tucson home, where he was recuperating after a weeklong hospital stay. “Gabby had turned toward my wife. She was between us. Then I turned toward my wife. And that’s when it happened. Next thing I knew, I was flat on the ground and my body…
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