Thomas Matthew Crooks’ motivation to shoot US President Donald Trump remains a mystery. Here’s what we know about him
The FBI announced Sunday that 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks from Pennsylvania shot former US President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Law enforcement officers shot and killed Crooks, who missed the presidential candidate by inches. The event killed a 50-year-old man, injured two other attendees and injured Trump’s right ear.
Authorities say Crooks slipped onto the roof 150 yards (140 meters) from Trump’s podium and began firing an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle that his father had legally purchased.
Who was Thomas Matthew Crooks?
Thomas Matthew Crooks, a resident of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, was a registered Republican who could have cast his first presidential vote in this year’s Nov. 5 presidential election. He graduated from Bethel Park High School in 2022 with a reputation as a promising and quiet classmate, Reuters news agency reports. His high school guidance counselor described him as a “respectable” person who mostly “kept to himself” and said he never thought of Criminals as a politician. The FBI said his social media profile did not contain threatening language and that they found no mental health issues.
Authorities were unable to determine his political leanings because his social media profile was devoid of posts advocating violence or similar activities. In addition, Crooks tried out for the rifle team during his school days but was kicked out because he was a bad shooter, the team’s current captain told the AP news agency. One of his classmates also said in an interview that Crooks’ interests were building computers and playing games. The home’s manager said in a statement that Crooks worked as a nutritionist at the nursing home.
According to public records, his father is a registered Republican and his mother is a registered Democrat.
What happened at Trump’s meeting?
Criminals drew the attention of law enforcement shortly after Trump’s campaign when onlookers saw him “behaving strangely,” the AP news agency reported.
According to the officer, bystanders saw him climbing the stairs, after which officers began searching for him, but did not find him until he reached the roof.
When the officer confronted Crooks on the roof, who was unable to fire his gun under the conditions, the gunman fired at Trump. He was then shot by secret service snipers, AP quoted two officers as saying.
The FBI said it is investigating the incident as a possible act of domestic terrorism and believes Crooks “acted alone” but is unsure of his motives and political beliefs.
Video posted on social media by the AP news agency shows Crooks, wearing a gray T-shirt with a black American flag on his right arm, lying motionless on the roof of a production building north of the Butler Farm Showground. , where the Trump rally was held. Photos of Crooks’ body reviewed by the news agency show him wearing a T-shirt from Demolition Ranch, a popular YouTube channel that regularly posts videos of its creator shooting targets such as mannequins with handguns and assault weapons.
