The bureau also searched the home of Thomas Crooks.
FBI agents have gained access to a phone belonging to Thomas Crooks, the man identified by law enforcement officials as shooting former President Donald Trump, the bureau said in a July 15 statement.
Specialists are continuing to analyze the phone and other electronic devices that belonged to Mr. Crooks, who was shot dead by law enforcement outside a Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 after he fired shots at the former president.
Agents completed a search of Mr. Crooks’ home and vehicle and carried out interviews with nearly 100 law enforcement officers, rally attendees, and other witnesses, the FBI said. The bureau is also reviewing tips that have come in since the shooting, including photographs and videos from the scene.
Video footage of the Crooks family home showed men in uniforms speaking with a man who had answered the door.
Mr. Crooks was 20. He graduated from Bethel Park High School and worked locally at a nursing home as a dietary aide. He was a registered Republican who donated to a liberal group in January 2021.
Mr. Crooks used an AR-style rifle that was purchased legally, according to the FBI.
One of the bullets pierced former President Trump’s right ear. The former president is fine, his campaign has said. He appeared with a bandage over his ear at the Republican National Convention on Monday.
Corey Comperatore, a 50-year-old former fire chief, was also struck by a bullet and died. Two other men, David Dutch of New Kensington, Pennsylvania, and James Copenhaver of Moon Township, Pennsylvania, were wounded but were listed as stable on Sunday.
The shots were fired from the top of a building located about 430 feet from where former President Trump was speaking.
Pennsylvania State Police Lt. Col. George Bivens told reporters that he believed the building was outside the event’s security perimeter.
“[I]t is incredibly difficult to have a venue open to the public and to secure that against any possible threat against a very determined attacker,” he said. “That’s a huge lift to try to do it.”
