Updated
Wray discloses new details on the FBIâs ongoing investigation into the shooting at a Trump rally in Pennsylvania.
Would-be Trump assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks searched for details about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy as well as how far Lee Harvey Oswald positioned himself from his target, said FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday.
After an FBI analysis of Mr. Crooksâs laptop, according to Mr. Wray, it was determined that the suspected gunman searched for how far Mr. Oswald was from President Kennedy during the 1963 assassination. Mr. Crooks carried out the Google search on July 6, the same day the Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, was announced, the FBI director told members of the House Judiciary Committee.
âOn July 6, he did a Google search for: âhow far away was Oswald from Kennedy,ââ Mr. Wray told the House panel.
FBI Director Christopher Wray said investigators believe suspected shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks visited a shooting range on July 12, the day before his attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
âWe do believe, based on what weâve seen so far, that he went to a shooting range the day before, and that he shot an AR-style rifle at that range the day before,â Mr. Wray said.
He said he wasnât positive if investigators had confirmed that the gun Mr. Crooks used at the shooting range was the same AR-15 that he allegedly used on July 13 at the Butler, Pennsylvania rally.
Suspected shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks purchased a ladder prior to the shooting, according to FBI Director Wray. But, he said investigators now believe Mr. Crooks used another method to scale the AGR building from which he attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump.
âWe now believe that the subject climbed onto the roof using some mechanical equipment on the ground and vertical piping on the side of the AGR building,â Mr. Wray said.
âIn other words, we do not believe he used a ladder to get up there.â
FBI Director Wray testified that the FBI has âeasily 700 agentsâ investigating the July 13 attempt on former President Donald Trumpâs life.
âIt has involved over half of the FBIâs 56 field offices, almost every headquarters divisionâwe even have some of our overseas offices working on it,â Mr. Wray said.
Asked why, the director advised that some of the gunmanâs communications methods and purchases involved foreign companies.
Investigators have yet to find any evidence that suspected shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks had accomplices in his attempt to assassinate former President Donald Trump, FBI Director Christopher Wray said.
âWeâre doing lots of different kinds of cellular analysis, geolocation stuff, looking at his accounts,â Mr. Wray told lawmakers Wednesday.
âFrom everything weâve seenâwhich is consistent with what weâve learned in interviewsâa lot of people describe him as a loner, and that does kind of fit with what weâre seeing in his devices.â
FBI Director Christopher Wray said investigators believe that suspected Trump shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks first visited the site of the former presidentâs Butler, Pennsylvania, rally one week before the July 13 event.
âI think, a week before, he spent roughly 20 minutes there,â Mr. Wray told the House Judiciary Committee.
Mr. Crooks then returned to the site on the morning of the rally âit appears for about 70 minutes,â Mr. Wray said, noting that he wasnât entirely sure of the accuracy of that time span.
FBI Director Christopher Wray said shooting suspect Thomas Crooks flew a drone for about 11 minutes at around 3:50 p.m. or 4 p.m. on the day of the rally to survey the surrounding area.
Mr. Wray said Mr. Crooks operated the drone about 200 yards from the stage where former President Donald Trump delivered his speech. The drone, Mr. Wray said, afforded the gunman a ârearview mirrorâ of the scene behind him and a better assessment of the angle toward the podium.
Pictures of public figures that were reported to have been found on suspected shooter Thomas Matthew Crooksâs phone were actually cached images from news articles, FBI Director Christopher Wray said.
The Associated Press reported last week that investigators found images of former President Donald Trump, President Joe Biden, and other public officials on Mr. Crooksâs phone.
Mr. Crooks also reportedly researched the dates of the Democratic National Convention and former President Trumpâs upcoming public appearances.
FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday provided an update on the federal investigation into the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump at a Butler, Pennsylvania, rally earlier this month.
So far, the FBI has not identified a motive for suspected gunman Thomas Matthew Crooksâ actions. He was shot and killed immediately after opening fire on the rally, killing one rally-goer, injuring two others, and striking former President Trump in the right ear.
âWe have recovered a drone that the shooter used,â he said at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, adding that it was taken from his vehicle. Two hours before the rally shooting, Mr. Crooks was flying the drone âabout 200 yards awayâ from the rally stage area, the FBI director said.
Local law enforcement had alerted the U.S. Secret Service to a suspicious individual before the shooting at former President Donald Trumpâs rally in Pennsylvania earlier this month, said the chief of the Pennsylvania State Police.
During questioning before the House Homeland Security hearing Tuesday, Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Col. Christopher Paris revealed new details about the security failure that led to the assassination attempt on former President Trump, which left one person dead and two injured.
Col. Paris said that âthere was a text thread goingâ with the Butler County Emergency Services Unit, who had seen suspected gunman Thomas Matthew Crooks and reported him as a suspicious person before the incident.
FBI Director Christopher Wray revealed that the Trump rally gunman flew a drone âabout 200 yardsâ away from the rally stage area hours before the shooting.
âWe have recovered a drone that the shooter used,â he said at a House Judiciary hearing, adding that it was recovered from Thomas Crooks’ vehicle.
Hours before the rally shooting, Mr. Crooks was flying the drone âabout 200 yards awayâ from the rally stage area, the FBI director also said.
FBI Director Christopher Wray began his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee by condemning the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump as a âparticularly heinousâ example of the alarming security threats he has recently warned of.
âI have been saying for some time now that we are living in an elevated threat environment,â Mr. Wray said, referencing his previous public statements concerning the dangers posed by the porous southern border.
Those dangers, he noted, include the trafficking of illicit drugs across the border to the possibility that terrorists could exploit the crisis to gain entry to the country.
Body camera footage taken in the aftermath of Trump rally shooting earlier this month was released on Tuesday, showing a member of the Beaver County Emergency Services Unit on the roof of the building after a gunman was shot and killed.
In the blurred, but graphic, footage, the official is seen standing on the roof of the building, while the shooterâs body is seen partially blurred in the clip. Local officials are heard communicating with U.S. Secret Service agents about what they knew as well as a timeline of events prior to the shooting.
The video as well as other records were released by the office of Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) on Tuesday, acquired from the Beaver County Emergency Services Unit âin compliance with congressional requests,â his office said.
The man who shot former President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania on July 13 had a detonation device, the stateâs top police official said on July 23.
âWe were aware of that very early on and that was a serious tactical consideration in the immediate aftermath as we worked that crime scene,â Col. Christopher Paris, commissioner of the Pennsylvania State Police, told a U.S. House of Representatives hearing in Washington.
Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) had asked Col. Paris for confirmation that Thomas Crooks, the 20-year-old shooter, had a detonation device and bombs in his car, which was parked near the rally.
Ten days after the failed assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally, officials have not found a motive, while other details about the shooter, who was killed that day by a Secret Service sniper, remain unclear.
The shooterâs father, Matthew Brian Crooks, 53, was spotted leaving a store on Monday, telling Fox News that he wonât be releasing a statement on the shooting for the time being.
Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the U.S. Secret Service, resigned on July 23, one day after her testimony before Congress about the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
âI take full responsibility for the security lapse,â she said in the email to Secret Service staff. âIn light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your director.â
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas soon after said he was appointing Ronald Rowe, the serviceâs deputy director, to serve as acting director.
Original News Source Link – Epoch Times
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