WASHINGTON — The man identified as the shooter in the apparent assassination attempt of former President Donald Trump was a 20-year-old from a Pittsburg suburb not far from the campaign rally where one attendee was killed.
Authorities say Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, opened fire at the rally before being killed by Secret Service on Saturday, days before Trump was to accept the Republican nomination for a third time.
An FBI official said late Saturday that investigators had not yet determined a motive. One attendee was killed and two spectators were critically injured, authorities said.
Relatives of Crooks didn’t immediately respond to messages from The Associated Press. His father, Matthew Crooks, told CNN late Saturday that he was trying to figure out “what the hell is going on” but wouldn’t speak about his son until after he talked to law enforcement.
Crooks’ political leanings were not immediately clear. Records show Crooks was registered as a Republican voter in Pennsylvania, but federal campaign finance reports also show he gave $15 to a progressive political action committee on Jan. 20, 2021, the day President Joe Biden was sworn in to office.
Public Pennsylvania court records show no past criminal cases against Crooks.
The FBI released his identity early Sunday morning, hours after the shooting. Authorities told reporters that Crooks was not carrying identification so they were using DNA and other methods to confirm his identity.
Law enforcement recovered an AR-style rifle at the scene, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation.
An AP analysis of more than a dozen videos and photos from the scene of the Trump rally, as well as satellite imagery of the site, shows the shooter was able to get close to the stage where the former president was speaking.
A video posted to social media and geolocated by the AP shows the body of a person wearing gray camouflage lying motionless on the roof of a building at AGR International Inc., a manufacturing plant just north of the Butler Farm Show grounds where Trump’s rally was held.
The roof where the person lay was less than 150 meters (164 yards) from where Trump was speaking, a distance from which a decent marksman could reasonably hit a human-sized target. For reference, 150 meters is a distance at which U.S. Army recruits must hit a scaled human-sized silhouette to qualify with the M-16 rifle.
Investigators believe the weapon was bought by the father at least six months ago, two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press.
The officials said federal agents were still working to understand when and how Thomas Crooks obtained the gun. The officials were not authorized to publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity
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Associated Press reporter Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Mike Balsamo in Chicago and Colleen Long in Washington contributed.