Judicial Watch claims new FBI docs reveal warnings about suspicious person before Butler shooting

Judicial Watch revealed Thursday that new FBI documents it obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request revealed that law enforcement had issued a suspicious individual warning in Butler, Pennsylvania, before the 2024 assassination attempt on President Donald Trump. 

The documents were part of a lawsuit Judicial Watch filed against the bureau last July after it failed to comply with a FOIA request on the shooting in 2024. 

The records include a “FD-302” investigative report from July 16, 2024, which states that on the day of the shooting, law enforcement received radio reports about an "unknown male acting suspiciously." 

"One report included the unknown male looking at a law enforcement sniper position," the report reads. "Several operators were communicating information about the unknown male back and forth over the radio--including to/from Command, to the Secret Service, to [Pennsylvania State Police], to 'everybody.'"

Other new documents include interviews with witnesses, including a female witness who claimed she heard six shots that appeared to come from two open windows that she heard an unidentified white male tell law enforcement officers should not have been open.

“These documents raise troubling new questions about Secret Service failures to protect President Trump. And it shouldn’t have taken years and a federal lawsuit to get this basic FBI material about the near assassination of President Trump,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement.

The documents also included notes from interviews with people who knew the suspected shooter, Thomas Crooks, with one neighbor describing Crooks' family as "normal, nice people," and Crooks as a "normal dorky kid.”'

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.