Report provides new main points on Trump assassination try suspect's 'descent into insanity'

The 20-year-old gunman who attempted to assassinate President Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, final summer time skilled a “descent into madness” main as much as the incident, all over which he used to be “having conversations with someone that wasn’t there,” a brand new record says. 

The New York Times, bringing up 1000’s of pages of college assignments, web process logs and interviews with dozens of people that knew Thomas Matthew Crooks and the investigation surrounding him, amongst different paperwork, reported this week that “he went through a gradual and largely hidden transformation from a meek engineering student critical of political polarization to a focused killer who tried to build bombs.” 

“There was a mysteriousness to Thomas Crooks’s descent into madness,” Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., who served on a Congressional process power that investigated the July 13, 2024 taking pictures, instructed the newspaper.  

He used to be “having conversations with someone that wasn’t there,” Higgins added, after finding out details about Crooks’ psychological well being all over a shuttle to Pennsylvania to analyze the assassination try. 

TEXTS REVEAL OFFICERS WERE AWARE OF THOMAS CROOKS 90 MINUTES BEFORE SHOOTING 

Prior to the taking pictures concentrated on Trump, the one time Crooks were given into bother used to be receiving lunch detention in heart faculty for chewing gum, in step with the New York Times.  

The newspaper reported that Crooks scored 1530 out of a conceivable 1600 at the SAT and graduated from the Community College of Allegheny County, the place he spent a number of semesters at the dean’s record whilst incomes an engineering level. He used to be getting ready to switch to Robert Morris University positioned out of doors of Pittsburgh, telling classmates he sought after to have a profession in aerospace or robotics, the newspaper added. 

However, Crooks’ father spotted his son’s psychological well being taking a flip within the 12 months earlier than the taking pictures and particularly after the May 2024 commencement, telling investigators he had noticed Thomas chatting with himself and dancing round in his bed room overdue at evening, the newspaper mentioned. The alleged habits coincided with a historical past of psychological well being and habit struggles in Crooks’ circle of relatives, the New York Times reported, bringing up parts of a record from the Pennsylvania State Police. 

A classmate mentioned to the newspaper that all over highschool, Crooks loved speaking concerning the economic system and cryptocurrencies. At group faculty, he reportedly designed a chess board for the visually impaired, equivalent to his mom, the New York Times added. 

“He seemed like a really intelligent kid – I thought he would be able to do whatever he wanted,” Trish Thompson, who taught Crooks’ engineering on the Community College of Allegheny County, instructed the newspaper. 

About a 12 months earlier than commencement, in April 2023, Crooks reportedly wrote an essay in choose of ranked-choice balloting in American politics, arguing towards “divisive and incendiary campaigns which are pulling the country apart.” 

“As we move closer to the 2024 elections we should consider carefully the means by which we elect our officials,” Crooks used to be quoted through the New York Times as pronouncing. “We need an election system that promotes kindness and cooperation instead of division and anger.” 

ATTEMPTED TRUMP ASSASSIN SEEN WALKING AROUND PENNSYLVANIA RALLY HOURS BEFORE OPENING FIRE 

An undated picture of Thomas Matthew Crooks. (Handout by the use of AFP)

Around that very same time, the FBI mentioned, Crooks made greater than 25 other firearm-related purchases from on-line distributors the usage of an alias.  

One acquire that Crooks made with an encrypted e mail deal with used to be gallons of nitromethane, a gasoline additive that can be utilized to construct explosives, in step with the New York Times. He reportedly indexed his house deal with for the supply. 

In the summer time of 2023, Crooks joined an area gun membership, the New York Times reported. 

The newspaper added that Crooks visited information and gun internet sites, in addition to the Trump management’s archives, earlier than narrowing his on-line searches within the days main as much as the assault to queries equivalent to ‘How far was Oswald from Kennedy?’” Searches also included “primary depressive dysfunction” and “melancholy disaster,” the Times said. 

He also reportedly continued to show up for his job as a dietary aide at the Bethel Park Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in the weeks leading up to the Trump assassination attempt. 

On the night of the shooting, ATF agents visited Crooks’ home in Bethel Park but had to evacuate after one spotted an ammunition can “with a white twine popping out” and a gallon jug labeled “nitromethane” in his closet, according to the New York Times. 

The parents of Thomas Crooks, Matthew and Mary Crooks, are seen returning to their home in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, on July 24, 2024. (Derek Shook for Fox News Digital)

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Outside the property, agents then interviewed Crooks’ parents, with them saying he liked building things and visiting the gun range, and his father also reportedly claiming that he did not “know the rest” about his son.