A witness near Donald Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday claimed he alerted police that the person who shot Trump was on the roof of a nearby building.
In an interview with the BBC after the incident, witness Greg Smith said he saw the gunman “crawling like a bear up onto the roof of the building next door” with a rifle.
“We’re pointing at him. The police are down there, they’re running around on the ground. We’re saying, ‘Hey man, there’s a guy on the roof with a gun’ … and the police didn’t know what was going on,” Smith said.
“I thought to myself, ‘Why is Trump still talking? Why didn’t they take him off the stage?'” he continued. “I stand there and point at him, you know, for two to three minutes … and then you hear five shots.”
Smith also questioned why the Secret Service wasn’t on all the roofs around the meeting, which took place in Butler. He told the BBC: “This is not a big place. [It’s a] security failure, 100% security failure.”
The Secret Service did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump suffered an injury to his right ear in the shooting. After the attack, the Secret Service said he was safe and seeking medical attention.
Secret Service personnel killed the gunman, identified by the FBI as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, at the scene. The FBI declared the attack an attempted murder during a briefing on Saturday.
