An official cause and manner of death has been released for former President Donald Trump’s would-be assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks.
Crooks died of a gunshot wound to the death, the Butler County Coroner’s Office told Fox News Digital on Saturday. His manner of death was ruled a homicide.
The 20-year-old was pronounced dead in Butler County, where he fired five rounds at a Trump rally on July 13 and nicked the former president in the ear before he was “neutralized” 26 seconds later.
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An undated image of Thomas Matthew Crooks. (Handout via AFP)
A post-mortem examination was completed in neighboring Allegheny County, where Crooks lived in Bethel Park, the Butler County Coroner’s Office said. Fox News Digital has reached out to that county’s office for comment.
It is unclear what happened to Crooks’ body after the examination. Fox News Digital has been unable to reach his family for comment.
Although investigators have not yet determined his motive, a picture of the 20-year-old man who attempted to assassinate former President Trump is becoming more clear as his former classmates come forward with their impressions.
Undated file photo of Thomas Matthew Crooks. Crooks is alleged to be the shooter in the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday, July 13, 2024. (Obtained by Fox News Digital)
Few people clapped when slender, bespectacled Thomas Matthew Crooks was handed his diploma at his graduation from Bethel Park High School in 2022, a YouTube video of the ceremony shows.
Former peers who have spoken out since he was shot dead by Secret Service agents on Saturday have characterized the Pennsylvania resident as a quiet loner.
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This graphic shows a bird’s eye view of the Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, as well as the alleged would-be assassin’s vantage point. (Fox News)
Julianna Grooms, who graduated one year after Crooks, told The Wall Street Journal that “people would say he was the student who would shoot up the school,” that he was bullied and that he was an “easy target.”
But a classmate who rode the school bus with Crooks and whose sister was close with the shooter told Fox News Digital that he had been mischaracterized by classmates who are “making up” the “most random information.”
“He didn’t talk a lot – but when he was talked to he would make good conversation,” the former Bethel Park High School student, who graduated a year behind Crooks, said on Friday night. “He was easy to talk to. He would make good conversation, he was very chill, very humble.”
A police officer walks past a home believed to be connected to the shooter in the assassination attempt of Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump, Monday, July 15, 2024, in Bethel Park, Pa. Investigators are hunting for any clues about what may have driven Thomas Matthew Crooks to try to assassinate Trump. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
“He had friends – he had friends on the bus, in class,” the classmate said. “Not a lot of people knew him, but the ones that did never had a negative experience with him.”
“You definitely have to be crazy to do what he did, but I was so surprised when I found out it was him,” she said.