Thomas Crooks' Online Searches Expose JFK Assassination Obsession — As His Dad Sparks Schizophrenia Fears By Claiming Failed Trump Gunman Spoke to Imaginary Friends
Thomas Crooks (left) was shot then candidate Trump in his right ear.
June 11 2025, Published 5:30 p.m. ET
Warning signs that Thomas Matthew Crooks was planning to try to assassinate Donald Trump last year on the campaign trail were apparently ignored, RadarOnline.com can reveal.
A scathing new analysis into the mind and motive of the 20-year-old has uncovered a "descent into madness" leading up to the murder attempt.
Crooks was a successful student with a bright future.
Crooks was shot to death by a Secret Service sniper after firing eight shots at Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024.
According to an investigation by the New York Times, Crooks was a star student in high school, where he received an SAT score of 1530 out of a possible 1600.
He later graduated from Allegheny County Community College, where he spent multiple semesters on the dean’s list while pursuing an engineering degree, and was ready to transfer to Robert Morris University, just outside of Pittsburgh, to work in aerospace or robotics.
However, all that changed when Crooks' father witnessed his son’s mental decline in the year preceding the shooting, and notably, after the May 2024 graduation, he told authorities that he had seen Thomas "talking to himself" and dancing around in his bedroom late at night, according to the newspaper.
According to the New York Times, Crooks’ behavior aligned with a long family history of mental health and drug issues — citing excerpts of a Pennsylvania State Police report.
Online Searches
A lack of foresight meant agents were scrambling to respond amid the gunfire.
In the final month before the shooting, Crooks conducted more than 60 searches related to both Trump and President Biden, as he debated an attack.
He visited news and gun websites, as well as the Trump administration’s archives, before narrowing his online searches in the days leading up to the attack to queries such as "How far was Oswald from Kennedy?"
Representative Clay Higgins, a Republican from Louisiana who worked on a congressional task force on the shooting, told The Times that he learned concerning information about Crooks’s mental health while investigating the case on a trip to Pennsylvania.
Higgins recalled saying Crooks was "having conversations with someone that wasn’t there" and added many questions about his motive remain unanswered.
"There was a mysteriousness to Thomas Crooks’s descent into madness," Higgins said.
The Moment of Attack
Crooks was shot dead by a Secret Service sniper moments after firing at Trump.
On July 13, 2024, Crooks climbed to the roof of the factory while Trump, 78, was giving a campaign rally and fired off eight bullets from his father's AR-15-style rifle.
One bullet whizzed through the air and struck Trump in his right ear. A second bullet struck and killed 50-year-old rally attendee Corey Comperatore. Two other Trump supporters were seriously injured.
After Crooks was killed by law enforcement counter-snipers, he was found with a bulletproof vest and remote control detonators in his pocket.
He seemed ready to cause further damage, as two remote-controlled bombs were discovered in his vehicle.
'Geeky Loner'
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Trump covered his ear with a bandage for several days after the attack.
Although investigators searched for clues, they may never know what drove Crooks to attempt to assassinate Trump. After he was shot dead, Crooks was described as a geeky loner by those who knew him.
An insider said: "The guy’s a ghost who kept to himself.
"It's likely we’ll never know for sure what drove this young man to try to commit a historic murder."
