Eyewitness Greg Smith says he saw a man crawling on top of a building just outside the Butler campaign site Saturday night.
He says he pointed out the gunman to police at the scene.
– I thought to myself: “Why is Trump still talking, why haven’t they removed him from the stage” … and the next thing I hear is the sound of five gunshots, says the eyewitness to the BBC.
Trump was immediately surrounded by Secret Service officers and escorted off the stage into a waiting motorcade. Trump was seen with blood on his face. Later, Trump himself said that a bullet had gone through the upper part of his right ear.
The suspected perpetrator was shot and killed by Secret Service agents, the security service confirmed later on Saturday evening.
Says the police did not notice the man
Smith tells the BBC that he saw Secret Service agents shoot the man on the roof.
Smith was not in the audience inside the audience area, but stood outside and listened to Trump’s speech.
The shooting happened just minutes following Trump took the podium.
– We noticed a guy crawling around on the roof of the building next to us, 15 meters away. He had a rifle. We might clearly see a rifle, says Smith.
– We point at him while the police are down on the ground and running around. We were like, ‘Hey there, there’s a guy on a roof with a rifle,’ and the police didn’t know what was going on,” Smith continues.
He says he spent 3-4 minutes trying to alert the police, but he doesn’t think the police saw the gunman because of the slope of the roof the shooter was on.
– Why aren’t there Secret Service people on all the roofs around here? This is not a big place, says Smith to the channel.
Was shot on the roof
– Did you see what happened to the shooter? asks the BBC reporter.
– Oh yes. They blew his head off, he says.
– They crawled onto the roof, they had their guns pointed at him, and they made sure he was dead. He was dead, and that was that. It was over, says Smith.
The Secret Service issued a statement on Saturday evening stating that the case is being investigated as an assassination attempt. The Secret Service confirms that the alleged perpetrator was shot and killed by their officers.
In addition, one person in Trump’s audience was shot and killed, and two other audience members were critically wounded.
Five shots
Another eyewitness who was inside the audience area has said that five shots were heard in rapid succession.
– We saw the Secret Service pounce on Trump to protect him. Everyone threw themselves very quickly towards the ground. He then stood up with a clenched fist in the air. He was a little bloody, he was bleeding from his ear. He got up and was alive and breathing,” a third eyewitness, named as Jason, told the BBC.
A doctor who was present in the audience tells CBS News that he treated one of the audience members who was hit by gunfire. The person was shot in the head, says the doctor.
– I heard the shots, and at first I thought they were China putters. Then someone started shouting: “He’s been shot, he’s been shot.” The man had turned around and fallen between two benches. There was a lot of blood there, says the doctor.
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2024-07-14 03:36:44
