FORT PIERCE, Fla. - Federal prosecutors presented their final witness on Friday in the case against Ryan Routh, the man charged with trying to assassinate President Donald Trump when he was running for president.
A Secret Service agent said he foiled Routh's alleged attempt to shoot Trump Sept. 15, 2024. The agent testified he saw a rifle barrel poking through a fence at the edge of the property. After the agent fired, the gunman fled without shooting the weapon.
FBI Supervisory Special Agent Kimberly McGreevy spent hours on the stand Thursday and Friday detailing evidence that tracks Routh's activities a month prior to the attempted shooting.
McGreevy drew on data from Routh's cell phones—he had six of them—and surveillance camera video to track Trump's movements. The agent testified that the accused moved between Mar-a-Lago, Trump's golf club, the airport where the president keeps his plane and a truck stop where Routh was living in his SUV.
The FBI agent said that during that time, "He was living at that truck stop, conducting physical and electronic surveillance … and stalking the former President."
McGreevy also detailed Routh's alleged purchase of the SKS-style rifle seized at the golf course by federal agents and his attempt to buy a more powerful weapon.
According to McGreevy's testimony, Routh sent a text to his girlfriend in Hawaii, asking, "How many bullets does an SKS rifle hold? An AK-47 can shoot to 500 meters. I have to get to 400."
Routh is representing himself in the trial after he told U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon that he was unhappy with his court-appointed lawyers. But he's had some setbacks. Prosecutors are seeking to block all of the evidence he wants to introduce in his defense. Judge Cannon has yet to rule on that, but she has already rejected most of his requests to subpoena witnesses.
When he begins his defense case Monday, Routh is expected to call a firearms expert and two character witnesses whom he says will speak to his "peacefulness, gentleness and non-violence."
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