The gunman, who attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania was identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks. Crooks is a resident of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, but officials refused additional information about him.
“This remains an active and ongoing investigation,” the FBI said in a statement.
The FBI said it was working to determine a motive for the attack, in which one rally attendee died and two other spectators were critically injured. Republican presidential nominee Trump was shot in the ear.
“I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin,” the former US President wrote in a social media post later.
According to official documents, Crooks do not have a criminal history reflected in Pennsylvania’s public court records. A voter-registration record showed that Crooks was registered as a Republican, though federal campaign-finance records show he donated $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a liberal voter turnout group, through the Democratic donation platform ActBlue in January 2021.
Crooks lived about an hour away from where the shooting took place in Butler. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)has closed the airspace over Bethel Park for “special security reasons”.
Law-enforcement officers had closed down all roads leading toward the home of the suspect’s family in Bethel Park. Numerous relatives did not respond to messages seeking comment, New York Times reported.
Crooks was killed after he fired from “an elevated position” outside the outdoor rally venue where Trump was speaking. An AR-15-type semiautomatic rifle was recovered near his body, officials said.
Law enforcement officials said on Saturday that Crooks carried no identification to the site of the shooting and had to be identified using other methods.
Crooks appears to have graduated in 2022 from Bethel Park High School, which has about 1,400 students, and received a $500 “star award” that year from the National Math and Science Initiative, according to The Tribune-Review in western Pennsylvania.
In an online recording of the 2022 graduation ceremony, Crooks can be seen crossing the stage amid applause, a slender young man with glasses in a black graduation gown, who briefly posed with a school official and accepted his diploma, NYT reported.
“We’re looking at photographs right now and we’re trying to run his DNA and get biometric confirmation,” Kevin Rojek, FBI special agent in charge, said during a press briefing.
USA Today reported that dozens of law enforcement vehicles were stationed outside a residence listed at the address on Crooks’ voter registration record. Agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on the scene and a bomb squad was at the residence, USA Today reported.
The perimeter of the residence of the suspect was guarded police caution tape. An Alleghany County Police vehicle was parked outside.
“It’s insanity that anyone would do this,” Dan Maloney, a 30-year-old resident from the area was quoted as saying by USA Today.
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, did not immediately respond to questions on whether the platforms had removed any accounts related to the suspect, Reuters reported.