Mehmet Ali Ağca (born January 9, 1958) is a Turkish assassin who shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981. After serving nineteen years of incarceration in Italy, he was deported to Turkey, where he is serving another life sentence for the murder of Abdi İpekçi, a left-wing journalist, in 1979. He is eligible for release in January 2010. Ağca has described himself as a mercenary with no political orientation, although he is known to have been a member of the Turkish ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves organization.