TUCSON, Arizona – The 22-year-old man accused of trying to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in a deadly shooting rampage wrote "Die, bitch" in a note found at his home, a sheriff’s official told The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Investigators believe Jared Loughner’s handwritten message was a reference to Giffords, Pima County Chief Rick Kastigar said. It was found in a safe alongside other ones, including "I planned ahead," "My assassination" and the name "Giffords."
Authorities also revealed other new information about the hours leading up to the Saturday shooting that killed six people and injured 14 others, including Giffords.
That morning, Jared Loughner’s father saw him take a black bag out of a car trunk, Sheriff Clarence Dupnik told the AP.
The father approached Loughner, and he mumbled something and took off running, Dupnik said. The father got in his truck and chased his son as he fled on foot.
Loughner took a taxi cab to the supermarket where the three-term Democrat was holding a meeting to hear the concerns of her constituents, authorities said earlier. Among those killed were a federal judge and a 9-year-old girl.
For all of it, Loughner’s parents, silent and holed up in their home since the shooting spree, apologized Tuesday.
"There are no words that can possibly express how we feel," Randy and Amy Loughner wrote in a statement handed to reporters waiting outside their house. "We wish that there were, so we could make you feel better. We don’t understand why this happened.
"We care very deeply about the victims and their families. We are so very sorry for their loss."
Meanwhile, the southern Arizona city shattered by the rampage prepared for an evening memorial service and a visit from President Barack Obama on Wednesday.
The apparent target of the attack, Giffords, 40, was able to breathe on her own Tuesday at an intensive care unit here, another hopeful sign of her progress and doctors said she will likely survive.
Doctors emphasized, however, she is in for a long recovery.
"She has a 101 per cent chance of surviving," said trauma chief Dr. Peter Rhee said. "She will not die. She does not have that permission from me."
She also can breathe on her own but still has a breathing tube in place as a precaution, said her neurosurgeon Dr. Michael Lemole.
In their briefing Tuesday, doctors also reversed themselves in describing the path of the bullet. They now believe she was shot in the forehead, with the bullet travelling the length of the left side of the brain, exiting the back.
Doctors previously thought she had been shot in the back of the head. They came to the new conclusion after reviewing X-rays and brain scans and consulting with two outside physicians with experience treating combat victims.
The brain’s left side controls speech abilities and the movement and sensation of the body’s right side. Giffords’ doctors will not speculate on the potential for long-term disabilities. But she is lucky the bullet did not cross into both sides, or hemispheres, of the brain, which can do devastating damage.
Two patients injured in the shooting were discharged from the Tucson hospital Sunday night. Seven others remained hospitalized.
The suspect in the shooting, Jared Loughner, made his first court appearance in Phoenix on Monday and looked on impassively as a judge told him he could face the death penalty for the shooting rampage that shocked the country. The judge ordered him held without bail.
Loughner is charged with one count of attempted assassination of a member of Congress, two counts of killing an employee of the federal government and two counts of attempting to kill a federal employee. Those are federal charges.
With few new details emerging at Monday’s hearing, questions remained about what could have motivated someone to arm himself with a pistol and magazines carrying 33 bullets each, and rain gunfire on a supermarket parking lot crowded with men, women and children.
Giffords had set up a booth there to hear the concerns of constituents.
Comments from friends and former classmates bolstered by Loughner’s own Internet postings have painted a picture of a social outcast with almost indecipherable beliefs steeped in mistrust and paranoia.
Associated Press writers Julie Pace in Washington, Marcia Dunn in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Paul Davenport in Phoenix, and Terry Tang, Pauline Arrillaga and Alicia Chang in Tucson, Arizona, contributed to this report.
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