The FBI has disclosed how Tyler Robinson, 22-year-old suspected killer of conservative activist, Charlie Kirk, was arrested after a 33-hour manhunt in the United States.
An intense manhunt by local and federal law enforcement followed Kirk’s murder on Wednesday by a sniper at Utah Valley University in Orem.
FBI Director Kash Patel told reporters on Friday that the suspect was taken into custody on Thursday night, about 33 hours after the shooting.
Patel said the FBI received more than 11,000 tips as of Friday morning, the most since the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.
He revealed that Robinson was captured after a relative and a family friend alerted the local sheriff’s office that he had confessed to them, or “implied that he had committed” the murder.
A bolt-action rifle believed to be the murder weapon was later found nearby, officials said.
“We got him,” Utah Governor Spencer Cox told reporters at a briefing on Friday.
Charlie Kirk’s killer arrested in Utah
The governor said security camera images, some previously released to the public, and evidence gathered from the suspect’s profile on the chat and streaming platform Discord also helped investigators link him to the crime.
Kirk, 31, a close ally of United States President Donald Trump who helped build Republican support among young voters in 2024, was killed by a single gunshot fired from a rooftop as he spoke onstage during an outdoor campus event attended by 3,000 people. Trump called the shooting a “heinous assassination.”
The killing has stirred outrage among Kirk’s supporters and denunciations of political violence from Democrats, Republicans and foreign governments.
In her first public comments since her spouse was gunned down, Erika Kirk vowed in a tearful but defiant livestreamed message on Friday evening that “the movement built by my husband will not die,” and that his radio-podcast show would continue.
She also thanked the ranks of law enforcement “who worked tirelessly to capture my husband’s assassin.”
The United States has been experiencing its most sustained period of political violence in decades.
Reuters has documented more than 300 cases of politically motivated violent acts across the ideological spectrum since supporters of Trump attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Trump himself has survived two attempts on his life, one that left him with a grazed ear during a campaign event in July 2024 and another two months later foiled by federal agents.
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