Details emerge on crucial element in assassination attempt: The AR-15 that was found with the shooter. https://t.co/ALAnQe87yL
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) July 15, 2024
Police officials called it an AR-15. An ATF agent called it “nothing special.” But the rifle at the center of countless controversies is now at the center of the attempt to assassinate former President Donald Trump.
An AR-15-style rifle was found next to the body of Thomas Matthew Crooks, the 20-year-old authorities say wounded Trump and others and left one man dead in Butler, Pennsylvania.
An FBI official said Sunday that the bureau believes the rifle, using 5.56 ammunition, was purchased legally by Crooks’ father, Matthew Crooks. The official, on a call with reporters, said he did not know whether Crooks had permission to use the weapon.
The Crooks family’s digital footprint is small, but some of their few online tracks tie them to internet marketplaces that buy or sell guns.
According to data from a website breach reviewed by USA TODAY, Crooks’ father, Matthew Crooks, made a purchase in 2020 from Botach, a website that describes itself as one of the leading retailers of tactical supplies used in law enforcement, the military and home defense.
The leaked data do not show the specific items purchased or the transaction amount, so it is unclear whether Matthew Crooks’ purchase was a firearm. The Botach website advertises a variety of semi-automatic rifles and many other goods.
The data was hacked from Eye4Fraud.com, said Megan Squire, deputy director of the Southern Poverty Law Center who provided USA TODAY an excerpt showing the purchase. Eye4Fraud.com is a company that screens online purchases on behalf of e-commerce merchants for potential fraudulent activity. Its data was hacked in February 2023 and posted to the dark web earlier this year.
It is unknown who hacked or posted the data, Squire said. The data shows only the one purchase by Matthew Crooks. …
The purchase record and online posting suggest “gun culture was in the home,” Squire said. “When we see this at SPLC, it just starts setting off a lot of the same flags that we see all day, every day with the folks and groups that we study.”
— Kenny Jacoby and Lucas Aulbach in Online Footprint Ties Gunman’s Father to Gun Marketplaces
So wannabe stasi / agitators use stolen data to make an assumption about those not directly involved based off a basic bitch AR bought from a typically overpriced but easy to find vendor? Not that I don’t make wild ass guesses but I also don’t pretend to be a legitimate civil rights organization.
They’re gonna hyperextend with all this reaching. Maybe pop a tendon.
I own a car…does that mean I have a ‘car culture’?
The Southern Poverty Law Center is a “left-wing smear group” that incites hatred and violence against conservatives.