Foreign News
Thomas Matthew Crooks: What we know about the Trump attacker
The small Pittsburgh suburb of Bethel Park in Pennsylvania is reeling after the FBI named a young local man, Thomas Matthew Crooks, as the person who shot at Donald Trump during a campaign rally and shocked the nation.
Investigators believe that Crooks, armed with an AR-style rifle, opened fire at the former president while he was addressing a crowd in Butler, Pennsylvania, leaving one audience member dead and two others critically wounded.
The 20-year-old kitchen worker was shot dead at the scene by a Secret Service sniper, officials said.
In his quiet and well-to-do hometown, however, neighbours are in shock, seemingly unable to grasp how a quiet young man is now accused in the shooting.
The FBI, for its part, has said only that Crooks was the “subject involved in the assassination attempt on the former president and that an active investigation was under way.
Thomas Crooks had not been carrying ID, so investigators used DNA to identify him, the FBI said.
He was from Bethel Park in Pennsylvania, about 70km (43 miles) from the site of the attempted assassination, and graduated in 2022 from Bethel Park High School with a $500 prize for maths and science, according to a local newspaper.
Crooks worked in a local nursing home kitchen just a short drive away from his home, the BBC understands.
State voter records show that he was a registered Republican, according to US media.
He is also reported to have donated $15 to liberal campaign group ActBlue in 2021.
According to US media reports, Crooks was wearing a T-shirt from Demolition Ranch, a YouTube channel known for its guns and demolition content. The channel has millions of subscribers featuring videos on different guns and explosive devices.
Law enforcement officials believe the weapon used to shoot at Donald Trump was purchased by Crook’s father, the Associated Press news agency reports.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, two officers told AP that Crooks’ father bought a weapon at least six months ago.
The day after the shooting, law enforcement sources also told CBS, the BBC’s US partner, that suspicious devices were found in Crooks’ vehicle.
According to CBS, the suspect had a piece of commercially available equipment that appeared capable of initiating the devices.
Bomb technicians were called to the scene to secure and investigate the devices.
Having established Crooks’s identity, police and agencies are investigating his motive.
“We do not currently have an identified motive,” said Kevin Rojek, FBI Pittsburgh special agent in charge, at a briefing on Saturday night.
The inquiry into what took place could last for months and investigators would work “tirelessly” to identify what Crooks’ motive was, Mr Rojek said.
Speaking to CNN, Crooks’ father, Matthew Crooks, said he was trying to figure out “what the hell is going on” but would “wait until I talk to law enforcement” before speaking about his son.
Police sealed off the road to the house where Crooks lived with his parents, CBS News reports.
A neighbour told CBS that officers evacuated her in the middle of the night with no warning.
Bethel Park Police said there was a bomb investigation surrounding Crooks’s home.
Access to the area remains tightly controlled with police vehicles blocking the roads. Only residents have been allowed in or out.
Law enforcement sources told CBS that they believe some degree of planning ahead of the shooting.
How much time was spent in that planning, however, remains the subject of an ongoing investigation.
Police believe he acted alone, but are continuing to investigate whether he was accompanied to the rally.
So far, a confusing – and at times conflicting – picture has emerged of who Crooks was as a person.
Speaking to local news outlet KDKA, some young locals who went to school with him described him as a loner, who was frequently bullied and sometimes wore “hunting outfits to school”.
Another former classmate of his, Summer Barkley, cast him differently, telling the BBC that he was “always getting good grades on tests” and was “very passionate about history”.
“Anything on government and history he seemed to know about,” he said. “But it was nothing out of the ordinary….he was always nice.”
Others simply remembered him as quiet.
“He was there but I can’t think of anyone who knew him well,” one former classmate, who asked to remain nameless, told the BBC. “He’s just not a guy I really think about. But he seemed fine.
Jameson Myers, a former member of the Bethel Park High School varsity rifle team who graduated alongside Crooks in 2022, told CBS that he did not make the team.
“He did not even make the junior varsity team after trying out,” Mr Myers added. “He never returned to try-outs for the remainder of high school.”
Mr Myers remembers Crooks as seemingly a “normal boy” who was “not particularly popular but never got picked on or anything.”
“He was a nice kid who never talked poorly of anyone and I never have thought him capable of anything I’ve seen him do in the last few days.”
A shooting club in the Pittsburgh area, the Clairton Sportmen’s Club, later confirmed that Crooks was a member, although club president Bill Sellitto did not provide any more details.
Other community members said simply that they were shocked that the alleged perpetrator of the shooting could have come from the quiet, green streets of Bethel Park.
Among them was Jason Mackey, a 27-year-old local man who lives near the Crooks residence and worked at his school while he was a student.
While Mr Mackey said that he did not know Crooks personally, he is still reeling from a sense of disbelief.
“It’s just shocking. You wouldn’t think an event of this magnitude would come right out of your backyard,” he said. “It’s just a crazy situation.”
One person was killed and two others were injured in the shooting.
All three victims are adult men and were audience members, CBS News reports.
At a news conference on Sunday, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro identified the deceased victim at Corey Comperatore, a 50-year-old volunteer fire chief who was killed when he “dived on his family” to protect them.
He said that Comperatore “died a hero”.
A GoFundMe page, organised by the Trump campaign’s national finance director Meredith O’Rourke, was set up in the hours after the attack with donations going to the families of the injured.
It has so far raised more than $340,000 (£267,000).
In a post to his Truth Social platform, Trump said he was “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear” and said he felt the bullet “ripping through the skin”.
Blood was visible on Trump’s ear and face as protection officers rushed him away.
Trump is “doing well” and is grateful to law enforcement officers, according to a statement published on the Republican National Committee (RNC) website.
One witness told the BBC that he had seen a man – believed to be Crooks – with a rifle on the roof of a building before Trump was shot.
Video footage obtained by TMZ shows the moment the shooting began.
The assailant opened fire with “an AR-style rifle”, CBS News reports.
Law enforcement sources also told CBS that he was reported by a bystander and identified as a suspicious person by police, but that officers lost track of him before the shooting began.
However, the FBI says it did not immediately know what type of firearm was used or how many shots were fired.
A Secret Service sniper returned fire and killed the gunman, the agency said.
Footage later shows armed officers approaching a body on the roof of the building.
(BBC)
A strong magnitude 7.5 earthquake has struck off northern Japan, prompting authorities to issue a tsunami warning for waves of up to 3 metres (10 feet).
The quake hit on Monday at 4:53pm local time (07:53 GMT) in waters off Iwate prefecture on Japan’s Pacific coast, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). It was felt across a wide area, shaking buildings in Tokyo, hundreds of kilometres (miles) to the south.
The JMA warned that the first tsunami waves could reach parts of the northern coastline immediately. “Evacuate immediately from coastal regions and riverside areas to a safer place such as high ground or an evacuation building,” the agency said.
“Tsunami waves are expected to hit repeatedly. Do not leave safe ground until the warning is lifted.”
Live footage from public broadcaster NHK showed no immediate signs of damage at several ports in Iwate.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said the government had set up a crisis management team and was working to assess the impact of the earthquake.
“For those of you who live in areas for which the warnings have been issued, please evacuate to higher, safer places such as higher ground,” Takaichi told reporters.
[Aljazeera]
Thousands of prisoners in Myanmar have been granted amnesty or had their sentences reduced. The pardon order by Min Aung Hlaing is one of his first official acts since the coup leader became president this month.
The move comes as the lawyer for jailed former leader Aung San Suu Kyi told the Reuters news agency that her sentence has been reduced. Former president Win Myint, detained since the 2021 coup, was also pardoned of his convictions, a statement from the presidency said.
Min Aung Hlaing approved an amnesty for 4,335 prisoners, Myanmar’s state television MRTV reported.
A communique on behalf of Min Aung Hlaing said “those serving death sentences shall have their sentences commuted to life imprisonment”, without naming specific prisoners.
“The President has pardoned Win Myint,” said another statement from Min Aung Hlaing’s office. Win Myint was “granted a pardon and the reduction of his remaining sentences under specified conditions”, MRTV said.
Suu Kyi, 80, is serving a 27-year sentence on charges her allies describe as politically motivated. Her sentence was cut by one-sixth, her lawyer told Reuters, but it remains unclear whether the Nobel Peace Prize winner will be allowed to serve the rest of her sentence under house arrest. Min Aung Hlaing placed Suu Kyi under arrest after the coup.
Amnesties typically happen as Myanmar marks Independence Day in January and its New Year in April.
Among those to be released are 179 foreign nationals, who will be deported. The amnesty also includes the commutation of all death sentences to life imprisonment, life sentences reduced to 40 years, and a one-sixth reduction in term lengths for all other prisoners.
[Aljazeera]
Several armed men robbed a bank in broad daylight in Naples, holding 25 people hostage before making their escape via a tunnel.
Police surrounded a branch of Crédit Agricole in the southern Italian city shortly after the robbery began around midday local time (10:00 GMT).
Local outlets reported that they negotiated with the robbers before the hostages could be released, about two hours into the robbery.
Firemen could be seen smashing in a window with battering rams and helping people climb out from inside in videos shared on social media.
Some hostages simply shook off the shards of glass and walked on.
But others looked visibly shaken, crying and hugging their relatives. Six people, who were in a state of shock, were offered medical assistance.
One man later told local news site Fanpage.it that the robbers had locked them into a room and that, while they were armed, “they did not use violence”.
Nobody was seriously injured. “Thanks to the swift response… all the hostages were freed shortly after 13:30 without serious injuries,” regional official Michele di Bari said in a statement.
A large crowd of bystanders, local residents and firefighters gathered in the square waiting for developments, while ten of thousands of people tuned into a livestream from the scene of the crime.
Members of the special forces of the carabinieri armed police were urgently flown in from Tuscany.
It was not until several hours later that they stormed the bank by breaking a window.
Several shots and the loud noises of stun grenades could be heard on the live feed shortly after.
But by then, the robbers had reportedly escaped through a tunnel, local media reported. It was thought they could have vanished into the sewer system.
The video feed later showed a number of carabinieri and firefighters peering into a manhole nearby as a crowd continued to mill about the square.
Fanpage.it reported that it was not yet possibly to quantify the value of the loot taken because the robbers had seized personal safety deposit boxes rather than cash.
(BBC)
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