By Theresa Braine
New York Daily News
BUTLER, Pa. — Newly released bodycam footage from the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump captures the moment an officer popped his head above the roof and saw the shooter pointing a rifle his way.
Just 40 seconds after a local police officer was hoisted up to the roof by a colleague, saw the gun and quickly dropped to the ground, Thomas Matthew Crooks began firing, according to video released by the Butler Township Police Department.
Crooks’ bullets killed one spectator, wounded two others and nicked Trump’s ear before a Secret Service sniper felled the shooter.
One clip shows the officer’s perspective as he’s being hoisted up, peeks over the edge of the roof and hastily drops down, while another captures the chaos that ensued as cops tried to gain access to the roof after Crooks opened fire.
Eventually they made it to the top of the building to find Crooks dead alongside his rifle.
The mad scramble to get at Crooks before they realized he’d been killed was also recorded.
“I need an ambulance in the back,” a voice can be heard saying over a radio, delineating there were wounded civilians. They turned out to be Corey Comperatore, a firefighter who died protecting his family, and two other wounded men, David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74.
In another piece of footage, cops can be heard discussing how they had told the Secret Service to station someone on that roof, and that Butler Township officers were inside the building. They couldn’t figure out how Crooks managed to scale it.
The officers expressed confusion and outrage as to why the roof was unmanned, with one stating he had flagged the building to the Secret Service days earlier. They also said the Secret Service assured them someone would be there, and while they were inside an adjacent building, they were not on the roof, according to CNN.
“I f---ing told them that they needed to post guys f---ing over here ... I told them that f---ing Tuesday,” one Butler officer can be heard saying in the camera’s audio. “I talked to the Secret Service guys. They’re like, ‘Yeah, no problem. We’re going to post guys over here.’ ”
The department did not release the names of the officers involved, citing the pending investigation, the Wall Street Journal reported.
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