Thomas Crooks’ Parents: Behavioral Health Experts in the Spotlight

October 3, 2024

As a follow-up to AbleChild’s report on the less-than-stellar hearing by the Bipartisan Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump, it seems important to discuss issues surrounding what role the alleged shooter’s parents might have played in the shooting.

First, almost immediately after the shooting incident there were several news reports about a phone call that was made by the alleged shooter’s father, Matthew Crooks, to police prior to the shooting incident.

According to the BBC “The father of the gunman who tried to assassinate Donald Trump called police before the Saturday shooting because he was concerned about his son.” And the BBC further reports that “Matthew Crooks’ father called police because he was worried about his son and his whereabouts…”

Another news report provides more detail about this phone call. According to the Daily Mail.com, “The parents of Trump’s would-be assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks, called the cops to say he was missing before the shooting.”  The Daily Mail further explains that “his father told law enforcement he assumed his son had gone to the shooting range at The Clairton Sportsmen’s Club to practice with his rifle and would be back by 1pm on Saturday.”

When AbleChild learned of the alleged phone call, it contacted the Butler Police Department requesting any and all records regarding the call but after an examination by authorities AbleChild was advised that “Based on a thorough examination of records in the possession, custody and/or control of Butler County, requested record does not exist in the possession, custody and/or control of Butler County, and request is therefore denied as no records exit…”

So, there are a few questions about these reports. First, did the father try calling the Clairton Sportsmen’s Club before calling the police? And did the father try calling his son on his cell phone before calling the police? It makes no sense to any parent that calls would first be made to law enforcement because a father was trying to locate a 20-year-old son on a Saturday afternoon who the father believed had gone to a shooting range for practice.

What was so important to the father that he resorted to calling the police about the whereabouts of his son? Could this be the reason that the FBI still is interested in Crooks’ parents?

It is also of interest that according to ABC News, the FBI, in a personal briefing with former President Donald J. Trump after the shooting incident, told Trump that “Crooks paid his father $500 for a rifle months before the assassination attempt…however, Crooks had to get the gun from his father before going to the rally site.”

This makes no sense. The FBI is, apparently, alleging that the father gave the son the rifle later in the day? So, what happened to the father’s call to police before the rally being worried about his son missing and having the rifle? Remember, the father thought the son had gone to the shooting range with the rifle for practice.

Something doesn’t add up. Either the father knew the whereabouts of his son and gave him the rifle that Saturday or he didn’t and the call to police seems odd, but believable. But it gets odder when one considers what has been reported about the alleged shooter’s modes of transportation.

According to CNN’s John Miller, “Crooks drove his Hyundai Sonata about an hour north…parked the car outside the rally, with an improvised explosive device hidden in the trunk that was wired to a transmitter he carried.”

Now let’s consider the reporting of the Daily Mail about how the police located Thomas Crooks’s white van. “This is the moment police descended on Donald Trump shooter Thomas Crooks’s van which he had abandoned on a side road near the Butler, Pennsylvania, fairground…” The Daily Mail further took credit for “exclusive footage” that “clearly shows officers searching the battered white vehicle from which they removed explosives after they were led across fields to its location by their K9 unit.”

A white van with explosives found by K-9? Yes. And there’s video footage of the assault on this white van that reportedly belongs to Thomas Crooks. So how, exactly, did Crooks get to the rally? Before answering that, there’s one more piece of interesting information that has to be considered.

According to documents made public by Senator Charles Grassley, apparently there are texts between ESU members that indicate that Crooks was seen parking his car in the parking lot of the AGR Building. According to texts from a sniper who was leaving the AGR Building around 4 p.m., “someone followed our lead and snuck in and parked by our cars just so you know.” That message was “sent at 4:26 p.m. to remaining Beaver and Butler snipers in the AGR building.”

It is very interesting that the FBI has not released any information about where Crooks’s Sonata, which had an explosive device in the trunk, was located. If we are to believe the departing sniper, he saw Crooks in the parking lot of the AGR Building an hour before the shooting. If this report is accurate, how hard can it be to determine how Crooks got the weapon onto the AGR building?

More importantly, the FBI or some law enforcement agency, must explain how the two vehicles, the white van and the Hyundai Sonata, were driven by Crooks to the rally. And more confusing is the discussion of Crooks’s bicycle which, early on, also was reported having been found at the rally.

Clearly there are several chinks in the investigative chain that need explanation, and it seems the Congressional Task Force is best suited to obtain these answers. First, did Crooks’ father make a call to police about his concerns about his son and a missing rifle? Secondly, has law enforcement identified the two vehicles, which both had explosives devices, that are reported to belong to Crooks? Did Crooks’s parents identify the automobiles, and have they been returned to the family?

These are no small issues. If the call to police from the father did occur, this may account for the FBI’s continued interest in the parents. The same can be said of the automobiles. Did someone in the family, other than the alleged shooter, have access to these vehicles on July 13th? The parents could answer these questions but they’re not talking and have lawyered up.  Is it wrong to hope that the Task Force could get answers to these questions? Maybe an invite for the parents to testify at the next hearing could be arranged?

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