As Donald Trump spoke onstage on Saturday, for two long minutes Thomas Matthew Crooks was able to take up position 140m away with a semi-automatic rifle.
Members of the crowd tried to warn law enforcement agents at the Butler Farm Show grounds — to no avail.
Analysis of aerial and satellite images of the site, along with videos filmed at the event, demonstrates the extent of the security failures both within and outside the rally’s perimeter ahead of the assassination attempt on the former president.
The US Secret Service faces several critical questions over its “shocking” handling of the day, said Charles Marino, a former agent who was assigned to protect former presidents Bill Clinton and George W Bush, and Joe Biden when he was vice-president.
Failing to lock down the building from which Crooks shot and injured Trump was a key error, he said.
“That building should make the hair stand up on the back of your neck as a Secret Service agent,” Marino said.
“I probably would not take my eyes off that building when first walking there, for at least a good 10 minutes. I would be thinking about the ways that I would need to take that out of play.”
On top of that failure, a series of warnings were not acted upon — red flags that the former agents said should have prevented Trump from ever stepping on to the stage.
Mike Olson, another former Secret Service agent, said: “We failed. The buck stops with the Secret Service.”
Warnings unheeded
Police officers had spotted Crooks acting suspiciously near scanners at the venue’s entrance before Trump began speaking, Butler County Sheriff Michael Slupe told the Toronto Globe and Mail.
A photo of Crooks was circulated, but officers did not know he was armed and lost track of him, Slupe said.
Law enforcement then failed to respond to warnings about the 20-year-old shooter. People were trying to raise the alarm for at least two minutes, according to video evidence and crowd testimony.
6.03pm: By the time the 78-year-old former president walked on to the stage just after 6pm — more than an hour later than planned — the gunman had access to the rooftop outside the event’s perimeter.
6.05pm: As Trump began addressing the crowd, people outside the perimeter fence noticed Crooks. Greg Smith told the BBC he saw someone “bear-crawling up the roof” a few minutes into Trump’s speech and alerted police.
6.09pm: Four minutes into the speech, Mike and Amber DiFrischia noticed Crooks and began recording him. DiFrischia told CNN his wife spoke to nearby police.
“My wife ran up to law enforcement — was trying to tell them, you know, where he was, but they couldn’t seem to see him because they weren’t in the right spot to see him on the roof. They were too close to the building,” DiFrischia said.
Around this time Ben Maser, also outside the perimeter, said he twice told officers about Crooks. “I saw the guy move from roof to roof,” he said.
6.11pm: Two minutes later a video captured someone in the crowd desperately shouting “he’s got a gun” and trying to get the attention of law enforcement as people began to panic.
Slupe told the Financial Times that a local police officer pulled himself over the edge of the roof seconds before Crooks opened fire, but the officer was forced to drop down after Crooks pointed his weapon at him. “Rightfully and smartly, the officer let go,” Slupe earlier told CBS News.
Another video, recorded from bleachers behind the stage, shows a small number of people running away from the building where the shooter was stationed. A police officer nearby takes a few steps towards the building, then steps back when shots ring out.
Snipers take aim . . . but not quickly enough
As the shooter took aim at former president Trump, snipers on the roof of buildings behind him appeared to notice something was amiss. Social media photos show them standing and monitoring the area with binoculars.
Shortly before the first shots are fired, they shift to a crouch and peer through their scopes in the direction of the shooter.
6.11pm: As Trump gestured towards a chart on the screens beside him, more people on the ground turned and noticed the shooter.
Suddenly a burst of three shots rang out, followed by another burst of five shots. FT analysis of the audio from multiple videos suggests these all came from the same gun.
As Trump fell to the ground clutching his right ear, the two teams of snipers on rooftops behind the former president quickly shifted their aim towards the shooter.
“Countersnipers don’t normally sit there with their weapons at the ready — they’re normally [there] with binoculars, looking for problems,” former agent Olson said.
“They go to their weapons to potentially address a threat. So something was happening and we know there was a heightened level of concern.”
An FT analysis of the snipers’ positions reveals that the northern pair, while closest, had no line of sight to the shooter — a large tree stands between their perch on a barn and the shooter’s position.
Analysis of the position taken by the southern pair shows they had a much clearer line of sight, unobstructed by the tree. Some locations on the rooftops, however, were out of the view of both teams, presenting a further risk.
“If the tree line is blocking that line of sight . . . that’s where it will become even more important,” Olson said. “That’s why we would want other resources and assets by the tree line and the parking lot.”
Immediately after the second burst of fire, a single shot with a different signature was audible as a sniper fired at the shooter. Ten seconds later, another shot rang out.
While the crowd was still scrambling for cover, the microphone on the stage picked up Secret Service agents saying “the shooter is down”.
Building not secured
Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle told ABC News that officers from nearby counties were inside the building from which the shooter fired, which is normally occupied by a manufacturing facility.
“In this particular instance, we did share support for that particular site. . . we sought assistance from our local counterparts for the outer perimeter,” she said.
She said the building’s sloped roof meant “there’s a safety factor . . . we wouldn’t want to put somebody up on a sloped roof”. The countersnipers were also on a sloped roof, however, according to images of the event.
A decision was taken to secure the building from the inside. The location of the local forces has been disputed, however, with one local official telling the New York Times that the officers were in fact in an adjacent building.
The Secret Service usually scopes out event venues ahead of time as part of the “protective advance”, to help create a security plan that is shared with local police, said former agent Marino.
“This should include mitigating those identified risks early,” he said. Such measures could include blocking any potential shooter’s lines of sight, he said.
At least a dozen police officers and sheriff’s deputies were assisting the Secret Service and Pennsylvania State Police with security. The Secret Service holds overall responsibility at such events and usually operates a joint command post, the former agents said.
Slupe admitted to CBS there was a failure in securing the premises from which the shooter fired, but said investigations should be allowed to take their course.
“My deputies performed their duties at their assigned areas and went above and beyond,” he said.
Sheriff Tony Guy from nearby Beaver County told the FT that three of his deputies were supporting the rally, but maintained that “they operated precisely within the guidelines established” by the Secret Service.
In a social media post on Tuesday, the Secret Service said it was “deeply grateful” for the “unwavering commitment” of its local partners. “Any news suggesting the Secret Service is blaming local law enforcement for Saturday’s incident is simply not true,” it added. It did not reply to a request for comment.
High-risk environment
Former agent Olson said an outdoor event attended by large crowds was “one of the hardest, potential risky environments to secure”.
“Fatigue” or “complacency” could have led to security teams letting their guard down, he added.
Both former agents criticised communications on the day, but praised the quick response of the snipers and Trump’s protective detail, who covered him with their bodies and rushed him into an armoured vehicle.
They both called for swift, independent investigations.
The evidence available to investigators “should be very clear”, Marino said. “This should not take months and months and months. Because you’ve got conspiracy theories and other nonsense being floated out there, and so speed is needed to squash that.”
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