What we know about Thomas Matthew Crooks, the suspected Trump rally shooter

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( NewsNation ) — Early Sunday morning, the FBI said the attempted assassin at President Donald Trump’s rally was a 20-year-old man named Thomas Matthew Crooks. Secret Service shot and killed Crooks seconds later.

The attack is the most serious attempt to assassinate a president or presidential candidate since Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981.

The former president, according to Trump campaign officials, is “fin e .”

Crooks is from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, about 60 miles from where the rally was held in Butler, Pennsylvania. NewsNation has learned neighbors of the suspected shooter were evacuated from their homes Sunday in Bethel Park.

Per state records, he’s a registered Republican, but The Associated Press reports he donated $15 to a progressive PAC the day President Joe Biden was sworn in.

The Secret Service said one rally attendee was killed and two were critically injured. The agency said Crooks fired from “an elevated position outside the rally venue.” All three victims are adult males, police said.

The FBI said they have no reason to believe there is a threat.

When asked whether the deceased suspect acted alone, Pennsylvania State Police Lt. Col. Bivens said: “It will be some time until we can conclusively say or answer that question.”

“We are not taking for granted that this was a lone wolf attack,” Bivens said.

Two officials who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to discuss the investigation said Crooks was not an attendee.

Law enforcement recovered an AR-style rifle at the scene, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person was not authorized to discuss details of the investigation.

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 the distance at which U.S. Army recruits must hit a scaled human-sized silhouette to qualify with the M-16 rifle.

Eyewitness accounts of the shooter

Witnesses told media outlets they saw Crooks on a roof outside the rally.

Easton Smith, who was outside of the security perimeter at the rally, said he saw a man climbing up the roof of a nearby building.

“Didn’t know what he was doing, trying to alert cops and police there was a guy crawling on the roof,” Smith said. “Then we saw a rifle slinged over his shoulder. After that, a couple shots fired off.”

A witness named Greg Smith told BBC News Crooks had crawled on top of the building located just outside the event. He said he pointed the gunman out to police.

“I’m thinking to myself, ‘Why is Trump still speaking, why have they not pulled him off the stage’ … the next thing you know, five shots ring out.”

Smith was listening from outside the rally and said he saw the gunman around five minutes into Trump’s speech.

“We noticed the guy bear-crawling up the roof of the building beside us, 50 feet away,” he said. “He had a rifle, we could clearly see a rifle.

“We’re pointing at him, the police are down there running around on the ground, we’re, like, ‘Hey man, there’s a guy on the roof with a rifle’… and the police did not know what was going on.”

Smith said he tried to alert the authorities for three to four minutes, but thought they probably could not see the gunman because of the slope of the roof.

“Why is there not Secret Service on all of these roofs here?” he asked. “This is not a big place. (It’s a) security failure, 100% security failure.”

He said he later saw the agents shoot the gunman: “They crawled up on the roof, they had their guns pointed at him, made sure he was dead. He was dead, and that was it — it was over.”

Two firefighters from nearby Steubenville, Ohio, who were at the rally told the AP that they helped people who appeared injured and heard bullets hitting broadcast speakers.

“The bullets rattled around the grandstand, one hit the speaker tower and then chaos broke. We hit the ground and then the police converged into the grandstands,” Chris Takach said.

“After we heard the shots got fired, then the hydraulic line was spraying all around, you could see the hydraulic fluid coming out of it. And then the speaker tower started to fall down,” Dave Sullivan said. “Then we heard another shot that you could hear, you knew something was, it was bullets. It wasn’t firecrackers.”

Law enforcement response

Trump was examined at a Butler, Pennsylvania medical facility after shots were fired. Trump ducked behind a podium and was rushed off by the Secret Service. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he felt a bullet hit his ear during the shooting.

He was later released from the medical facility.

This incident is currently under investigation and “the Secret Service has notified the FBI,” said Anthony Guglielmi, Secret Service chief of communications.

The FBI said it has assumed the role of the lead federal law enforcement agency in the investigation.

Police soon told the people remaining to leave the venue and U.S. Secret Service agents told reporters to get “out now. This is a live crime scene.”

A copy of an email from an RNC source shows Trump campaign staffers being asked to stay away from the DC and Palm Beach offices.

“In response to this violence, we encourage those of you who remain in DC and West Palm Beach to stay away from the office tomorrow, as we assess both locations,” the email reads. “We are enhancing the armed security presence with 24/7 officers on-site.”

This story has been updated to correct the distance between Bethel Park and Butler, Pennsylvania.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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