What we know about the 20-year-old man who tried to assassinate Donald Trump

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.

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.

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”.

Also on Sunday BlackRock, the world’s largest money manager, said Crooks briefly appeared in an advertisement for the company.

Crooks was one of several pupils who appeared in the background of the 2022 ad and was unpaid, BlackRock said. The ad was filmed at Crooks’ school, Bethel Park High School.

The company did not describe the content of the ad but said footage will be made available to the authorities and that it will be removed from circulation.

“The assassination attempt on former President Trump is abhorrent. We’re thankful former President Trump wasn’t seriously injured, and thinking about all the innocent bystanders and victims of this awful act, especially the person who was killed,” Blackrock said.

Additional reporting by Bloomberg