Six weeks have gone by since the unsuccessful attempt on Donald Trump’s life.
On July 13, the 45th former US president narrowly escaped death when 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Crooks fired from a slanted rooftop just 150 meters to Trump’s right.
Since the incident, the FBI has been conducting an investigation, which led to the death of volunteer fire chief Corey Comperatore and left two others critically injured.
Trump did not escape entirely unharmed; one of the multiple bullets grazed the top of his right ear.
Crooks, who worked in a kitchen, was equipped with an AR-style rifle. He was shot dead by the Secret Service 26 seconds after he began shooting at the rally.
The FBI is now examining Crooks’ family, including his father, Matthew Crooks, who, according to a Mail Online source, is a gun enthusiast who has previously sold weapons to family members.
The publication’s informant, who is a relative of the Crooks family and wished to remain anonymous, told the paper, “The FBI still very much has questions about how much they knew and how he [Thomas] slipped through the net.”
The agency intends to question Crooks’ parents to determine if they had any knowledge of their son’s assassination attempt.
In a significant move, Crooks’ 53-year-old father has reportedly hired a top legal team in Pittsburgh to assist him and his family through the investigation.
Both the BBC and CNN reported that the shooter’s parents attempted to contact their son, and when they couldn’t reach him, they then contacted the police.
News that Crooks’ father retained legal counsel comes just weeks after the 20-year-old’s body reportedly ‘went missing’.
Louisiana Republican Clay Higgins, appointed to review the motives behind the assassination attempt, recently stated that when he tried to view Crooks’ body on August 5 as part of his investigation, he was informed that it was not there.
The former police captain-turned-lawmaker revealed in a recent report that his request to see the body ’caused quite a stir and revealed a disturbing fact.’
Higgins discovered that the FBI had ‘released the body for cremation 10 days’ after the attempt on Trump’s life and had sent Crooks’ remains back to his family.