Did Thomas Matthew Crooks, A Poor Marksman At School, Get Help In Trump Assassination Bid? Internet Abuzz

Did the suspect who shot at former Donald US President Donald Trump act alone? Among the many questions surrounding the shooting at Trump’s event in Pennsylvania’s Butler, this one, in particular, has intrigued a large number of users on social media, where conspiracy theories are spreading like wildfire after Sunday’s incident that has not only jolted the bitter political space in the US but has also sent shock waves around the world. Concerns have been raised over how Thomas Matthew Crooks — a 20-year-old who was taken down immediately after he allegedly pressed the trigger — could get access to a rooftop from where he would have a direct shot at Trump, and questions have been asked whether he could plan (and almost successfully execute) the entire operation alone.

A section of netizens is convinced that Crooks had help and that there was a deep conspiracy. Officials have said Crooks’s social media profile does not contain threatening language, nor have they found any history of mental health issues, even as they look to identify a motive. His attack, which shocked the world, killed one spectator and critically injured two others.

Forensic analysis has suggested that as many as three weapons could have been fired, according to the CNN, even as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has suggested that the gunman appeared to have acted alone.

Citing an audio analysis, the American TV network reported that “the first three shots were consistent with alleged weapon A, the next five were consistent with alleged weapon B, and the final ‘acoustic impulse’ was emitted by a possible weapon C”. The analysis was done by Catalin Grigoras, director of the National Centre for Media Forensics at the University of Colorado in Denver, and Cole Whitecotton, Senior Professional Research Associate at the same institution. To be sure, Secret Service snipers gunned down Crooks after he opened fire — which could have been captured in the audio analysis.

In an article about the shooter, news agency Reuters has written that the portrait pieced together of Crooks, a nursing home aide who came within inches of killing a presidential candidate, reveals frustratingly little about why he would make such an attempt. And it is this mystery that has fanned conspiracy theories — some wild, some not so much — surrounding his act.

Many of those who believe the shooter got help have posted on X what appears to be a clip from a Fox News show, wherein the anchor reports that officials believe the shooter acted alone and that they have yet to retrieve data from his phone. “How can the #FBI determine the shooter “acted alone” if they can’t access the shooter’s #1 means of communication?… is this a joke?” one user wrote. Another person wrote: “I just saw where the FBI put out a statement that the shooter was acting alone in the assassination attempt of President Trump. So we now know there was a conspiracy, and the shooter did NOT act alone. The CIA failed.”

The FBI has said that they are investigating the shooting as a potential act of domestic terrorism, that Crooks — who allegedly had bomb-making materials in the car he drove to the rally — might have acted alone, and that officials have recovered limited information from his mobile phone. “The FBI is telling the media that they cannot open the cell phone of the shooter and they believe the shooter acted alone. This seems like a cover-up. It makes no sense,” another user posted on X.

A fourth user posted: “Did the shooter act alone? The critical question: Would an untrained 20-year-old have the wherewithal to plan and execute so complex a plan solo, almost to the point of “success”?”

A fifth user re-shared a clip that purportedly captures a Secret Service sniper on a rooftop moments before the attack that came from the other side. The question this user asked: was Crooks the real shooter or just a scapegoat?

It has emerged that Crooks was bright but a quiet person, a loner who was bullied at school. A former classmate at Bethel Park High School said he was “a comically bad shot he was unable to make the [school’s rifle] team and left after the first day”.

“The shooting range at the school is 15 metres (50 feet) long by 6.4 metres (21 feet) wide, with seven ranges. Crooks once fired from the seventh lane — the closest lane to the right wall — and hit the left wall, completely missing every target on the back wall. He missed his target by close to 6.1 meters (20 feet),” Jameson Murphy, the former classmate, told the New York Post. A resident of Bethel Park, about an hour away from where the shooting occurred, Crooks, however, was a member of a local shooting club named Clairton Sportsmen’s Club.

Crooks is said to have targeted Trump from a distance of about 150 metres (500 feet), with the CNN quoting sources as saying that the shots came from the “three o’clock” position of the former President’s podium location. Trump later said a last-moment head tilt saved him from the assassination as a bullet grazed his right year. According to law enforcement officials, the gun Crooks used was a legally purchased AR-style semiautomatic rifle traced to his father, which helped officials to determine the gunman’s identity because he was not carrying identification, the CNN added.

Crooks, whose bloodied body was found on the rooftop where he had hunkered down before firing at least five rounds, would have been old enough to vote in his first presidential election this November. Federal Election Commission records have showed that a donor listed as Thomas Crooks with the gunman’s street address gave $15 to Progressive Turnout Project, a Democratic-aligned political action committee, in January 2021, when Crooks was 17, the CNN reported. He is also said to be a registered Republican. His high school counselor described him as “respectful” and said he never knew Crooks to be political, according to Reuters.