Pennsylvania police bodycam footage obtained Thursday through a records request shows two officers trying to intercept Thomas Matthew Crooks on a roof just seconds before he allegedly tried to assassinate former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in July.
The footage is taken from two officers from the Butler Township Police Department who attempted to stop Crooks seconds before he fired his AR-15 rifle, which struck the former president in the ear and killed rally attendee Corey Comperatore, injuring two others.
“F—ing this close, bro. Dude, he turned around on me,” said the officer who was hoisted, which can be heard later in the video.
One officer can be spotted hoisting another officer onto the roof where Crooks had stationed himself — about 12 feet above the ground.
Crooks pointed his weapon at the officer who had scaled the building before the officer ducked his head and lost his grip on the edge of the roof, falling about eight feet to the ground and spraining his ankle, according to Butler Township Manager Thomas Knights.
The footage captured Crooks toward the end as officers surrounded his body after counter-snipers fatally shot him.
“I’m f—ing p—ed. We couldn’t find him,” said another officer on the bodycam footage.
“Before you motherf—ers came up here, I popped my head up there like an idiot by myself, dude,” said the officer, who was boosted onto the roof. “Then he turned around, and I f—ing dropped, and I started f—ing; I was calling out, ‘Bro, f—ing on top of the roof.’ F—ing, we’re not on the same frequency?”
Matthew Pearson, Butler Township PD Lieutenant, told a local outlet the officer could not draw his weapon since he was hanging from the building.
Just seconds later, Crooks opened fire, grazing Trump’s right ear. Three rallygoers were additionally shot, including Comperatore, 50, who was killed protecting his wife and daughters from danger.
Additional Butler Township police department footage shows officers immediately after Crooks was shot and killed.
James Copenhaver and David Dutch were injured after being shot at the rally. They have both since returned home.
In the footage released Thursday, officers can be seen standing over Crooks’ body on the rooftop.
In another bodycam video, officers asked why the American Glass Research (AGR) building roof, from which Crooks took the shot, was not manned.
“I thought you were on the roof?” questions one officer.
There also appeared to be confusion about whether or not the shooter was neutralized and why Crooks wasn’t taken out before opening fire.
“If you’d all had a gun up there…I’d have shot him. He wouldn’t have ripped out a gun up there,” says one officer on the bodycam.
The footage is only the most recent piece of publicly available information that sheds some light on what transpired that day and what was attempted to stop Crooks.
Lapses in security have led to finger-pointing among several agencies
The security lapses that paved the way for the shooting have been obscured by finger-pointing among the numerous agencies involved at the federal, local, and state levels.
Ronald Rowe, acting Secret Service Director, said a video of someone moving along the roof minutes before Trump was shot confirms a “failure.”
The video shows a figure moving along the roof of the AGR building only minutes before shots rang out at Trump’s rally.
The FBI revealed previously that Crooks had traveled to the rally site at 11 a.m. the day of the shooting and spent an hour there before heading home.
Crooks didn’t return to the scene until 3:50 p.m. Local law enforcement officers from their designated positions noticed him for the first time about 5:10 p.m. — around 50 minutes before Donald Trump took the stage — according to documents obtained from GOP Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, who received them from Beaver County Emergency Services Unit (ESU).
Crooks, on his return to the rally site, flew a drone around 200 yards from where Trump was set to speak, according to the FBI. Later, the agency said no videos or photos were taken from the drone and that it didn’t locate a memory card in it.
Local law enforcement took a picture of Crooks and escalated it to command at 5:30 p.m.
“Kid learning around building we are in,” wrote an officer in a text message along with a photo of Crooks. “AGR, I believe it is. I did see him with a range finder looking towards the stage. FYI. If you wanna notify SS snipers to look out.”
“I lost sight of him,” added the officer.
“Call it in to command and have a uniform check it out,” read a follow-up message.
The “kid” would be killed by a counter-sniper after he opened fire on rally attendees by 6:12 p.m.
On rally day, Crooks parked his vehicle and flew a drone between 3:50 p.m. and 4 p.m., around 200 yards from where Trump would speak on July 13. Director of the FBI Christopher Wray testified during a July 17 congressional hearing that Crooks had been at the rally site for about 70 minutes the morning of the attempted assassination.
