Video Shows Individual on Roof Right Before Trump Assassination Attempt

Person RUNNING on Roof at RALLY

Minutes before the tragedy that left one attendee dead and three others, including Trump, injured, a person can be seen sprinting across a roof (the same roof from which Thomas Matthew Crooks shot Trump) in a widely shared video that was captured by one of the attendees of the former president’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

 

The footage was initially obtained by Fox News. It was filmed by James Copenhaver, one of the injured victims from the July 13 event. An individual is seen running across the roof where Crooks later took shots. Fox News reports that the footage was shot around 6:08 p.m. If that’s right, this happened roughly thirty minutes before Crooks started shooting at Trump.

 

After being shot twice, Copenhaver suffered critical injuries and is presently receiving treatment in a rehabilitation facility, according to lawyer Joseph Feldman of the Law Offices of Max C. Feldman. Copenhaver “had almost seen or heard something whiz past him, which we’re assuming was a bullet,” the attorney told the publication.

 

“He felt it on his arm, and he looked down at his arm…and felt pain initially, but he hadn’t even realized he had been shot a second time at that point. It could have been shock,” he added.

 

This newly discovered footage comes when the U.S. Secret Service is being grilled by Congress over how Crooks was able to have a direct line of sight to the former president on that particular day. The agency has been unable to adequately respond to basic inquiries.

The fact that Crooks managed to fly a drone in the vicinity approximately two hours before the gathering without causing any alarms raises even more unresolved issues. It also begs the question of how Crooks on the other roof escaped the purported sight of Secret Service counter-snipers.

 

Acting Director of the Secret Service Ronald Rowe told the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Tuesday that the agency was unaware of Crooks until it heard gunfire.

 

Rowe said to legislators, “From what I understand at this point, neither the former president’s security detail nor the Secret Service counter-sniper teams were aware that there was a man on the roof of the AGR building with a firearm.”

 

He went on, saying that a Secret Service counter-sniper “neutralized the assailant within seconds after the assailant fired his weapon. It is my understanding that those personnel were not aware the assailant had a firearm until they heard gunshots,” he said. The counter-sniper did not need to get permission before firing to employ lethal force to neutralize an assailant.

 

Rowe’s claim is in line with the justification given by former US Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle for the roof’s lack of covering—the “safety factor” associated with placing someone on a “sloped roof.”

 

Rowe declined to identify the specific person who had turned down requests for increased security from Trump’s security detail during the previous two years during Tuesday’s hearing.