The 20-year-old nursing-home employee from suburban Pittsburgh who tried to assassinate former US president Donald Trump was a registered Republican who packed explosives in the vehicle he drove to the campaign rally an hour from his home.
Police were working on Sunday to learn more about Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, to determine what motivated him to open fire on the rally from a nearby rooftop, killing one spectator, before he was shot dead by the Secret Service.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said on Sunday it has not yet identified any threatening writing or social media posts from Crooks, who graduated from high school two years ago and had no past criminal cases against him, according to public court records. The FBI believes he acted alone.
![Jason Kolher, who attended the same school as Thomas Matthew Crooks, talks to the media in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania on Sunday. Photo: Reuters image](https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/07/15/5b4cf168-0378-4e1a-a6ad-59a7306458f1_ac707f82.jpg)
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, said on social media the upper part of his right ear was pierced in the shooting. Two spectators were critically injured, authorities said. The man killed was Corey Comperatore, a former fire chief from the area who Pennsylvania’s governor says died a “hero” by diving onto his family to protect them.
Relatives of Crooks did not immediately respond to messages from Associated Press. His father, Matthew Crooks, told CNN late on Saturday that he was trying to figure out “what the hell is going on” but would not speak about his son until after he talked to police.
Crooks graduated from Bethel Park High School in 2022. In a video of the school’s graduation ceremony posted online, Crooks can be seen crossing the stage to receive his diploma, appearing slight of build and wearing glasses. The school district said it will cooperate fully with investigators. In his senior year, Crooks was among several pupils given an award for maths and science, according to a Tribune-Review story at the time.
Jason Kohler, who said he attended the same school but did not share any classes with Crooks, said Crooks was bullied at school and sat alone at lunch time. Other pupils mocked him for the way he dressed, such as hunting outfits, Kohler said.
“He was bullied almost every day,” Kohler told reporters. “He was just an outcast, and you know how kids are nowadays.”
Crooks worked at a nursing home as a dietary aid, a job that generally involves food preparation. Marcie Grimm, the administrator of Bethel Park Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation, said in a statement she was “shocked and saddened to learn of his involvement”. Grimm added that Crooks had a clean background check when he was hired.
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 US$15 to a progressive political action committee on January 20, 2021, the day US President Joe Biden was sworn into office.
Butler County district attorney Richard Goldinger told Associated Press on Sunday that Crooks had been previously unknown to investigators in his county and had not been on their radar. He said the investigation had so far not turned up any evidence that he had coordinated with anyone else in the region.
A blockade had been set up on Sunday preventing traffic near Crooks’ house, which is in an enclave of modest brick houses in the hills outside blue-collar Pittsburgh and about an hour’s drive from the site of the Trump rally. Police cars were stationed at an intersection near the house and officers were seen walking through the neighbourhood.
Bomb-making materials were found inside Crooks’ car near the Trump rally and at his home, according to two officials who were not authorised to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. A white Allegheny County Police truck identified as bomb squad pulled up to the home late on Sunday morning.
![Donald Trump is seen with blood on his face surrounded by secret service agents as he is taken off the stage after an assassination attempt at a campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday. Photo: AFP image](https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/07/15/6db91ae4-deb6-4ff8-ac32-b8afd4ce9ca7_b12d6d37.jpg)
Police recovered an AR-style rifle at the scene of the shooting, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation.
Investigators believe the weapon was bought by the father at least six months ago, two police officials said.
One local police officer climbed to the roof and encountered Crooks, who pointed his rifle at the officer. The officer retreated down the ladder, and Crooks quickly took a shot towards Trump, and that is when Secret Service snipers shot him, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.
A video posted to social media and geolocated by Associated Press shows Crooks wearing a grey T-shirt with a black American flag on the right arm lying motionless on the roof of a manufacturing plant just north of the Butler Farm Show grounds where Trump’s rally was held.
![Two FBI investigators scan the roof of AGR International, the building adjacent to the Butler Fairgrounds, from which Matthew Thomas Crooks fired at Trump. Photo: Getty Images via AFP image](https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/07/15/aa3a0067-2c32-4ba3-831d-28d8319d454f_15c047f4.jpg)
The roof where Crooks lay was less than 150 metres from where Trump was speaking, a distance from which a decent marksman could reasonably hit a human-sized target. For reference, 150 metres is a distance at which US Army recruits must hit a scaled human-sized silhouette to qualify with the M-16 rifle.
Images of Crooks’ body reviewed by Associated Press show he appears to have been wearing a T-shirt from Demolition Ranch, a popular YouTube channel with more than 11.6 million subscribers that regularly posts videos that show creator Matt Carriker firing off handguns and assault rifles at targets that include human mannequins and vehicles.
Carriker, who lives in Texas, did not respond to a phone message or email on Sunday, but posted a photo of Crooks’ bloody corpse wearing his brand’s T-shirt on social media with the comment “What the hell”.
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