For about 2 1/2 minutes, at least five Pennsylvania law enforcement officers converged around the warehouse where a gunman had clambered onto a roof near a rally held by former President Donald Trump, struggling to reach the attacker before he shot at Trump, newly released police videos and a social media video show.
The body camera and dashcam footage, paired with an eyewitness video posted on YouTube, provide new insight into the presence of and the response by Pennsylvania law enforcement at the building where the gunman, Thomas Crooks, was positioned. They reveal for the first time the critical moments — starting around 6:08 p.m. — when officers establish Crooks’ location, frantically try to find a way to get onto the roof and determine that he is armed. By around 6:11, Crooks opens fire.
Before the release of the videos, the exact movements of nearby law enforcement officers — and the actions they took to address a newly identified threat — were unclear. Testimony from state police and Secret Service officials provided some details, but the footage obtained by The New York Times through a public records request gives the first second-by-second retelling from the perspectives of two of the officers near the gunman at the time of the shooting.
The footage also raises more questions as to why the Secret Service failed to remove Trump from the stage in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, while local law enforcement officers were scrambling to get to Crooks, even if they weren’t yet aware that he had a firearm.
The footage analyzed by the Times includes 12 videos released Thursday by the Butler Township Police Department, showing at least three Butler officers and one Pennsylvania state trooper focused on the roof from where Crooks fired. Eyewitness footage previously published on YouTube shows that a fifth law enforcement officer was also responding in the same area.
The earliest body camera video captured near the complex of warehouse buildings, owned by AGR International, begins seven minutes before the shooting.
At first, some officers appear to be responding to reports, documented in text messages and an after-action report obtained by the Times, that a suspicious person is moving away from the rally.
An officer is seen searching in the nearby woods at 6:04 p.m. While the officer is surveying this area, Crooks is about 270 yards away, scaling a building at the opposite end of the complex. At 6:08 p.m. the body camera of the officer captures Crooks walking on the roof of one of the buildings, which are connected by catwalks. It’s unclear if the officer sees Crooks.
Another officer arrives at the scene in his vehicle at 6:09 p.m. At this point, videos show five officers scattered near the building from which Crooks would later fire. The state trooper stands on a picnic table to look for the suspicious person on the roof while bystanders look on.
Then, four officers congregate on the east side of the building.
There, the officer who has just arrived by car is hoisted up so he can see onto the roof. According to previous testimony by Col. Christopher Paris of the state police, the officer made eye contact with the gunman, but dropped back to the ground when Crooks pointed the gun at him.
He then communicated over the radio that Crooks had a gun, according to testimony last week from Ronald Rowe Jr., the acting Secret Service director. Rowe added that the radio message had never made it to the Secret Service.
Video shows the officer running back around the building.
About 40 seconds after the officer sees him over the side of the building, at 6:11 p.m., Crooks fires. The officer flinches and retreats from the building as a Pennsylvania state trooper is seen pointing a rifle at the roof. Crooks is shot by a Secret Service sniper shortly after.
In the immediate aftermath, law enforcement are seen still scrambling to gain access to the roof, shouting for a ladder. In a body camera video that had audio enabled, the officer who had made eye contact with Crooks describes the shooter’s appearance, warning the other officers to “watch out because he can (expletive) come right down on you over there” — apparently not yet sure that Crooks has been killed.
Ten minutes after the shooting, the cameras capture multiple officers on the roof next to Crooks’ body, visibly distraught by their inability to stop the shooting.
“What are the chances, what are the (expletive) chances,” says one officer. At the same time, outside the building, another officer says that he warned the Secret Service to guard the area days earlier. “I told them to post (expletive) guys over here.”
On another camera, an officer said in frustration, “We were watching him.”
Anthony Guglielmi, a Secret Service spokesperson, said the agency was reviewing the body camera footage and called the attempted assassination a “Secret Service failure.”
“The U.S. Secret Service appreciates our local law enforcement partners, who acted courageously as they worked to locate the shooter that day,” Guglielmi said. “We are reviewing and updating our protective policies and procedures in order to ensure a tragedy like this never occurs again.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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