Text Messages Indicate That a Sniper Spotted the Gunman Who Shot Former President Donald Trump Earlier Than Previously Reported
Members of a local SWAT team at the scene the day former President Donald Trump was shot spoke out for the first time Monday, citing communication failures with the Secret Service but acknowledging that “we all failed that day.”
“I remember standing in the parking lot talking to one of the guys” after the July 13 shooting, Mike Priolo, a member of the Beaver County, Pennsylvania, SWAT team, said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “We just became part of history. And not in a good way.”
Also Monday, ABC News reported obtaining text messages indicating that would-be gunman Thomas Matthew Crooks drew the attention of a sniper more than 90 minutes before the shooting began on the grounds of the Butler Farm Show. That is more than a half-hour earlier than previously reported.
A sniper leaving the area where local SWAT members assembled texted the others that he saw Crooks “sitting to the direct right on a picnic table about 50 yards from the exit.” He also texted that Crooks saw him leave the area with a rifle “so he knows you guys are up there.”
About an hour before the shooting, sniper team member Gregory Nicol told “GMA “Good Morning America” he saw Crooks take a rangefinder from his pocket. Though rangefinders were not banned from rallies, Nicol took Crooks’ picture and called in a warning of a suspicious presence.
“He was looking up and down the building,” Nicols said. “It just seemed out of place.”
Crooks opened fire shortly after 6 p.m., killing rally attendee Corey Comperatore, 50, wounding Trump in the ear and critically injuring two other men. A Secret Service sniper on another roof fatally shot Crooks, authorities say.
“I think we all failed that day,” Priolo said. “People died. If there was anything we could have done to stop that, we should have.”
Meeting with Secret Service did not take place
The Secret Service, responsible for security that day, typically is supported by local law enforcement. Jason Woods, team leader for Beaver County’s Emergency Services Unit and SWAT sniper section, told “Good Morning America” his team was supposed to meet with the Secret Service before the event.
“That was probably a pivotal point, where I started thinking things were wrong because (the meeting) never happened,” Woods said. “We had no communication … not until after the shooting.”
Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle took responsibility for the security breakdown and resigned from her post.
Trump to cooperate with shooting probe
Trump has agreed to sit for a standard interview “consistent with any victim interview we do,” Kevin Rojek, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Pittsburgh field office, said during a media briefing with reporters. Rojek said the FBI wants Trump’s perspective of what happened.
FBI officials said they had yet to identify a motive for Crooks, the gunman. But they said he had conducted online searches into prior mass shooting events, improvised explosive devices and the attempted assassination of the Slovakian prime minister in May.
Article by John Bacon
