Piecing Together the Story of a Would-Be Assassin
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There are some stories that you just can't let go. That's what happened to me with the mysterious case of Thomas Crooks, the 20-year-old who last July tried to assassinate Donald J. Trump at a presidential campaign rally in Butler, Pa.
I remember the moment well. It was early Saturday evening when my phone began to light up with notifications: Mr. Trump had been shot.
By the following morning, the authorities had identified Mr. Crooks as the gunman who fired eight bullets toward Mr. Trump, grazing him in the ear. Mr. Crooks had also killed a bystander and injured two others before the Secret Service shot and killed him.
Immediately, my colleagues and I began trying to learn everything we could about Mr. Crooks. I worked the phones while other reporters cultivated sources in law enforcement and knocked on the doors of Mr. Crooks's classmates and neighbors, looking for clues about why his life had taken a murderous turn.
Within a few days, we published an article tracing Mr. Crooks's path from honor student to gunman. The piece offered an eye-opening portrait, but there was still so much about him that remained unknown.
But the world seemed to move on. The presidential race was underway; President Joseph R. Biden Jr. dropped out and Vice President Kamala Harris replaced him on the ticket; there was another apparent assassination attempt, this time at one of Mr. Trump's golf courses in Florida; and then, Mr. Trump reclaimed the presidency. I was busy, too, working on a series of stories exploring another pressing matter: the dependence of American companies on undocumented migrant workers.
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