Florida Attorney Announces Federal Charges in Trump Assassination Attempt

Florida Attorney Announces Federal Charges in Trump Assassination Attempt

Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, has been criminally charged in the Southern District of Florida with respect to the incident yesterday at Trump International Golf Course.

The charges include “possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession and receipt of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.” Routh “had his initial appearance today before Magistrate Judge Ryan McCabe in the federal courthouse in West Palm Beach,” according to the announcement by attorney Markenzy LaPointe.

The complaint alleges that “a US Secret Service agent walking the golf course perimeter saw what appeared to be a rifle poking out of the tree line.” After the agent fired a service weapon toward the rifle, a witness reported seeing a man, later identified as Routh, fleeing the area in the treeline.

Routh was subsequently “apprehended by officers from the Martin County Sheriff's Office in coordination with the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office.”

In the treeline area from which Routh fled, agents reportedly “found a digital camera, a backpack, a loaded SKS-style rifle with a scope, and a black plastic bag containing food.” The serial number on the rifle was obliterated. The complaint further states that “Routh was convicted of felonies in North Carolina in December 2002 and March 2010 and therefore was prohibited from possessing a firearm.”

The FBI is “leading this ongoing investigation” as an “assassination attempt upon the former president.”