Charlie Kirk, a conservative youth leader with a huge following and US President Donald Trump’s close supporter, was shot dead on Wednesday when he was speaking at a university in Utah. In a breakthrough in the case, US federal and local authorities announced that the alleged shooter was arrested.
The attacker was reportedly arrested in Washington County in the State.
Who Is Tyler Robinson?
According to IANS, the authorities identified the attacker as Tyler Robinson, 22-year-old, who is from Utah.
“We got him”, Utah Governor Spencer Cox had said, announcing on Friday the arrest of the alleged assassin of Charlie Kirk.
Cox, at a news conference with Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel at his side in Salt Lake City said, “The family member referenced a recent incident in which Robinson came to dinner prior to September 10, and in the conversation with another family member, Robinson mentioned Charlie Kirk was coming to” the Utah Valley University (UVU).
Tyler Robinson was turned in by his father, who recognised his photographs circulated by law enforcement and had heard him making radical statements, as per IANS, Trump said in an interview with Fox News.
Robinson’s father told his priest about him after recognising him in the photographs, and he contacted law enforcement. Subsequently, he was arrested without incident.
Also Read: Charlie Kirk’s Wife Breaks Down Remembering Him, Says ‘He Loved Me And Our Children’
Kirk was close to Vice President JD Vance and had lobbied with Trump to make him his running mate.
Kirk was invited to UVU by its chapter of Turning Point USA, the conservative youth group he founded.
Charlie Kirk Assassination
Kirk, who was 31 years old, was delivering remarks during a campus event on Wednesday when shots rang out. He was rushed to the hospital but succumbed to his injuries shortly after.
Utah officials on Thursday had released a video of the assailant jumping off the roof of a building and running away towards a wooded area, where they later retrieved the gun used in the shooting. Furthermore, the investigators have recovered bullet casings with multiple inscriptions.
Kirk’s killing was the latest in the tide of political violence in the US. In June, a man assassinated the former speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives and her husband.
(with IANS inputs)