How to track threats:
Q: Okay. What did you all do from there?
A: I text message Officer , who was part of our QRF, who was stationed near the inner fence line, the corner of the fenced area where the State Police troop car and female sheriff’s deputy’s car were both sitting near where the combine was that day.
[Witness marking.]
A: So I look across, and I see Officer standing over there looking at our building with binoculars. So I text message Officer , and I said to him – this is right about 1715 – I said, “Do you see the guy at the base of our building?” described him, and said that he has a rangefinder.
I did not get a response from for about 20, 25 minutes.
Q: What did eventually respond with?
A: He called me.
It was 1740-ish, 1735, somewhere in that general area.
called me. We discussed it over the phone. He said he was also – he did observe Crooks. He was also watching another, I believe, one or two suspicious individuals that he could see from his vantage point.
Q: Between 1715 when you text him and 1735 when you called, what kind of actions are you and taking? Because at this point he’s moved – Crooks has moved around the building, right?
A: That’s correct.
Q: And you’re no longer able to see him?
A: That’s correct.
Q: So what are you guys doing in that time period?
A: So we are essentially going window to window with binoculars trying to pinpoint where he’s at.
At that point, like I said, you probably have 100, 150 people now gathered out there. So locating him was – that made it more difficult. You’re looking at everybody in the crowd now at this point.
Q: Okay. So calls, says he observes Mr. Crooks?
A: Yes, that is correct.
He lost him going around the western side of the building.
Q: So maybe I’m confused. I thought him going around the western side of the building, I thought you said happened at 1715.
A: So he did go around the western side of the building at 1715.
But he had come back again, got to the open area, I’m going to say multiple times, two – two, three times.
Q: So at this point Mr. Crooks is still kind of wandering around aimlessly?
A: Yes.
Q: Okay. 1735 calls and says, “Hey, I lost him but I had him,” right?
A: Yeah. He did observe him. He did confirm that he had observed him.
So at that point we did notify through our text thread , through the sniper text thread, so all snipers were aware at that point.
sent the text message along with the two photographs to the sniper text thread. responded with “Notify command.” And then he forwarded the pictures on to Secret Service counter snipers and command staff.
Q: Or how do you know that forwarded those pictures on?
A: I’ve seen his text messages to .
Q: So directly texting individually with ?
A: Yes.
Q: Do you know where was set up?
A: I believe he was on – I’m not 100 percent sure. He was on one of the rooftops.
I believe he was part of the southern group, but I’m not 100 percent sure.
So, like I said, at 1738 did forward that out. He did notify command via radio. confirms description of the male, which I believe I misheard – or may have misspoken or I misheard , and I made a correction over the radio saying that it was a gray shirt. I believe I heard green shirt.
And then that’s when it was notified – everybody was notified over the radio on ops 4.
Q: What time was that, approximately?
A: Probably – right around 1745, 1750.
Q: Did you ever see law enforcement – let’s focus – let me actually ask you this.
When do you reacquire or resee Mr. Crooks?
A: So at that point I didn’t see him again.
[Nicol] did. Like I said, as we’re going from window to window, I need to note that there was a suspicious package and bicycle – package meaning backpack – and bicycle sitting next to a gas meter off of the northwest corner of the AGR complex.
So that being said, that was also put out to command, and they advised that they would have officers responding to not only check out Crooks but to check out the suspicious backpack and bicycle.
Q: I want to ask, at any point do you ever see – and, again, prior to the shooting – do you ever see Mr. Crooks with a backpack?
A: I did not.
Q: You said Sergeant [Nicol] eventually saw Crooks again.
A: So I had returned to, again, return back to my window and was continuing to look over the crowd. At that time, [Nicol] yells across the second floor to me that now Crooks is at a picnic table with a backpack.
[Witness marking.]
Q: And you were back at your window?
A: Yeah. I was back over here [indicating].
So I immediately run to [Nicol]'s location. tells me Crooks took off not in a run but at a – essentially a brisk walk north. He then disappeared in between these two portions of the AGR building.
We did not know that was all interconnected. But [Nicol] observed him head back here. And then that’s when [Nicol] said, “I’m going to try to locate him.” And that’s when he left the second floor.
Q: Did anything precipitate that event? In other words, when he – when Crooks started moving around that time, were you hearing anything from the event that might have changed or cued that sudden movement for Mr. Crooks?
A: Not that I’m aware of. I mean, there was music playing loudly. Nothing that I would say that changed during that time frame.
Q: Okay, yeah. Let me ask you this also. About how long after that, if you recall, did President – former President Trump begin to speak?
A: I don’t recall.
DJT was announced at 180233.
#https://youtu.be/Rr63RgGN-Yo?t=23632 announcement
Announcment finished, music started at 180237.
#https://youtu.be/Rr63RgGN-Yo?t=23638 music start
Crooks started running, Nicol radioed at –
(Well, he transmitted that at 180243. But! Prior to that he called Lenz at 180234. So he followed the protolol, first he said he wanted the command’s attention. It is a little correction to Nicol’s testimony.)
#https://youtu.be/Rr63RgGN-Yo?t=23793 music end
DJT started speaking at 180512.
(I guess Crooks assembled his rifle between the buildings and waited Mr Trump to start his speach.)
A: If you could tell me what time he took the stage. I’m not 100 percent sure what time he did.
Q: So tell me about the decisions then. He leaves the site. Sergeant leaves his post – leaves the area. Tell me about that decision-making and how you observed that situation.
A: There was no decision-making on my part. He just said he was going to look for him and off he went. There was no discussion. There was no --**
And from my position, at that point I was focused on looking to where Crooks had disappeared around the building, but I could also see the suspicious backpack next to the gas meter.
Q: So you sort of have these two things in your mind, both suspicious, not rising to any further level? Or how do you view those two items, Mr. Crooks and the backpack?
A: The backpack itself by the gas meter obviously seemed suspicious. It had been left there for quite some time. Nobody was around it. So that did seem suspicious.
Crooks, seeing him with the rangefinder obviously raised some serious suspicion.
And it felt like it progressed. The next time we saw him, he now has a backpack. The next time he’s observed he has a backpack.
Q: Between when Sergeant left and when obviously you heard the shots, are you just continuing to look around in that general area of the windows at the end of the hall –
A: Yes.
I am still diligently looking, trying to locate Crooks amongst the crowd that had gathered out here, but also keeping my eye on that package, waiting for what I was assuming was going to be uniformed officers showing up over there.
Q: Did they ever come to that area prior to the shots?
A: So uniformed officers did not. It turned out that the two individuals I saw walk over to the backpack were undercover Pennsylvania State Police troopers.
Q: Prior to the shots, did you ever – you say the radio was on ops 4, right?
A: Correct.
Q: Did you ever hear anything come over ops 4 prior to the shot after Sergeant left?
A: The only thing I heard was Commander activating one of the QRFs.
Q: And that was immediately preceding the shots?
A: Correct.
--------------- 8< ---------------
p44
Thanks for checking to see if Curran, Hercules and threat fit in the redacted boxes. I wonder why they saw fit to redact “threat”? I thought “Hercules” was pretty much common knowledge as well.
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We have another one to add to the USSS team, as well as the PSP trooper he paired up with at one point.
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Nice find! So I’m thinking the ‘resp’ is for respite or something along those lines, in line with his description. The CS was throwing me off, thinking it was for “Counter Sniper”, but I’m wondering if maybe it’s “Command Support” or something like that.
He also touches on why he was vest-less:
And is this a redaction in the white blank spot “her and -blank-”? Odd.
No problem, and certainly there seem to be some odd redactions made throughout these transcripts. There must be some reasoning behind it, but they still seem quite unusual at times.
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It’s Counter Sniper Response Team (CSRT). Not to be confused with Counter Surveillance Unit (CSU). They redacted it throughout the transcript, but I did see one use that wasn’t, but didn’t want to read through it again to find it. If you haven’t noticed it yet, the search function doesn’t always find words that are in the transcripts. I’ll try to find it. Meanwhile, his PSP partner was Trooper Graham.
On Page 61, Line 13.
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Nice, thank you! No, I hadn’t gotten there yet, and then the search I tried crashed my Acrobat! 
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And I just realized the search feature, is case sensative. It found CSRT, but not csrt.
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That’s good to know! And now that I’m looking at it, if you’re using Acrobat as well, there’s a way to change that […]:
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I thought I had read the USSS counter sniper team leader transcript in full earlier, but I guess I had only searched for and read the parts directly relating to shots fired. I read the whole thing yesterday. Here are the bits that I found interesting. My comments are in italics.
Page 42
HSGAC Majority: Did you ever see Crooks on the roof?
Witness: I did not see the individual on the roof until after my partner gave the shot, and I identified the body looking where he was seeing, and I was able to identify. I could see his shoulder back to the top of the individual. That was the first time I’d seen the individual.
Is this guy vision impaired or what?
Pages 70-71
HSGAC Majority: And just one last quick question, jumping back to the rally, on July 13th. In your discussions with the local law enforcement snipers, was there ever any discussion of possibly putting local snipers on the roof of the AGR building?
Witness: I don’t think they ever mentioned they wanted to be on the rooftop itself of the AGR building. From the beginning I believe it was inside the AGR, looking out the windows, basically.
I believe this is disputed. Perhaps others can weigh in here?
Page 81
Witness: Not that I couldn’t see all the roof. When he took the shot, I didn’t have eyes on the target yet, or the shooter himself yet. The way it occurred was – we both started scanning, looking for threats. [Hercules1] said, “I got him.” I immediately gave him a wind call – when you’re doing a shooter/spotter, a wind call is basically any adjustments you’d have to make to the wind. That day there was minimal wind. It would be left to right, at most. But at 200 yards it’s minimal, so there should be no correction. So I gave him the wind call center, send it, basically don’t make any corrections. We do this in training a lot.
From there I heard his round go off, and then I immediately – I still couldn’t find what he was shooting at, so I got off my gun and looked to see what angle he was looking at. I figure out he was looking at the roof, got on, and then I saw the target that he had shot at.
I’d like to know how he knew it was 200 yards if he couldn’t see the target. For all he knew the guy was on the far AGR building.
Page 112
HSGAC Minority: What was your opinion of them going into this, their professional abilities and their competence and their, you know, ability to do the job?
(HSGAC Minority is referring to the members of the Hercules 2 team)
Witness: Just for the record, I’m the most junior guy who was on this trip. All these guys are senior to me and have been on the team longer than me. All of them are fantastic shots, crack shots. They can call my wind any day. I would 100 percent, no question, take their word for it.
Now this is really interesting. The team leader was the least senior counter sniper out there??? Just like agent Melissa ‘ducks and can’t holster her gun’ McCarthy was the Site Agent?
Page 116
HSGAC Minority: Did you notify PI, Protective Intelligence?
(referring to the BOLO put out around 5:45)
Witness: PI actually reached out to me. I believe it was the PI assist. She was on a golf cart, and she was actually right on the fence line. She reached out after the locals had sent me the text, asking if I was tracking this information. I said, “Yep, we’re already looking for it,” and she said, “Okay, if you see him, I want to talk to him.” I said, “Not a problem. We’ll call you direct.” And then when I sent the email out to my team with the information on the BOLO, I said, “Go to the Security Room or go direct with a PI agent.”
Page 130
HsGAC Majority: If the CS Response Team – and again, my understanding is this is one Secret Service special agent plus a local police officer. Right?
Witness: Correct.
No particular comment here, it’s just news to me.
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More interesting stuff from the counter sniper team leader:
Page 136
HSGAC Majority: when you heard that alert, did you associate that alert about locals working something at the three o’clock, about 200 yards out, with the BOLO and text you had received roughly 15 minutes earlier, about the same location?
Witness: Honestly, at the time, no, I didn’t associate the two. What we heard was gunshots, and I wasn’t sure if maybe it was behind the building, police had shot someone, someone had shot at police. I actually didn’t realize they were shooting at the stage and there was an individual on the roof until [Hercules 1, D. King] told me, “I got him.” Until that second I wasn’t sure. You know the sound of gunshots but I wasn’t sure what was happening.
This guy either IS dumb, or he’s playing dumb. He hears gunshots, and he doesn’t assume they are being aimed at the protectee?
Page 137
HSGAC Majority: And totally understanding, you know, the difficulties in the moment, but did the fact that the BOLO and the text message from roughly 15, 20 minutes earlier contained a report of a rangefinder not factor into how you received and reacted to that [Counter Sniper] alert?
Witness: We definitely want to look out for someone with a rangefinder, a disturbance of the police over on the AGR side. We had no reason to believe someone was on the roof, so that really wasn’t on the – in my mind at the time. But realistically I thought there was something happening basically on the ground on that side, either behind the building or we couldn’t see anything in front of the building, facing the stage, I guess.
Page 138
HSGAC Majority: You said earlier that you turned your attention, you and your partner, [Hercules 1, D. King], turned your guns toward the AGR. That was after you received Officer [Hercules 2]’ radio alert. Is that right?
Witness: Yes. He said police were working a situation, and when we looked, just plain eyes, no optics or anything, you could see police running towards the building with their hands on their pistols. I think one actually had a pistol facing towards the ground, out of a holster. That’s a pretty big deal for us, so immediately we turned and faced our guns towards the threat area. We didn’t know what was happening, but it seemed pretty serious, especially with the locals’ response.
The admission that he sees a police officer with a pistol drawn comes back to bite him later.
Page 142
Witness: Yes. When we saw police officers with their hands on pistols, that was kind of a, I don’t know, orange alert. Not red when you see a gun, but somethings happening that requires police to have guns.
Page 143
HSGAC Majority: And you were never made aware, before 4 shots were fired, that anyone was on the roof nor that the 5 suspicious person was armed. Is that right?
Witness: No. I had no information
Page 144
HSGAC Majority: Can you walk us through again how many shots you recall hearing before [Hercules 1] fired?
Witness: I distinctly remember hearing three shots. That was bullets or gunshots. And immediately started hunting for the source. I didn’t know the individual, was he shooting at the protectee or was behind the building, anything like that. I was just trying to find where.
…
So I distinctly heard three shots, and then I remember [Hercules 1, D. King], saying “I got him”, and then from there on I don’t remember hearing anything except I gave a wind call, and I remember – I seem to remember, [Hercules 1]’ shot, because I’m familiar with the sound of our rifle.
This is really interesting. He claims he never heard any shots between the first three and the one his partner made. I don’t know what to make of that.
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More CS Team Leader testimony:
Page 149
HSGAC Majority: Was there ever a radio alert that the shooter was down?
Witness: I said, “Shots fired on tango,” but I didn’t say the target was down because honestly I didn’t know if he was down. I wasn’t really sure that he was not going to move until they put the flexicuffs on him, and he didn’t move an inch. They basically moved his entire body.
HSGAC Majority: Did you hear anyone else say, over the radio or otherwise, that the shooter was down?
Witness: I don’t recall hearing that on the radio, no.
HSGAC Majority: It’s our understanding, just based on public videos, that the shift detail that was surrounding former President Trump on the stage after shots fired verbally said, “Shooter down.” You can just hear that on the mic pickup from the rally. Do you have any understanding of how they came to that knowledge or understanding?
Witness: No.
So nobody actually knew that even Crooks was dead, much less the status of any other possible shooters.
Page 150
HSGAC Majority: You don’t recall hearing any other shots fired besides [Hercules 1] and Crooks?
Witness: I feel like there may have been more shots after Crooks’ original three shots, but I don’t know. They didn’t – a lot was happening at the time, and honestly I can’t remember clearly what happened. But I distinctly remember the three beginning shots, and then I remember [Hercules 1]'s suppress shot, which sounds different than I’m used to. Other than that, it’s possible, but I can’t tell you for certain what happened.
Page 154
HSGAC Majority: Is it your understanding that Secret 3 Service radio communications are generally recorded?
Witness: Generally, I think they’re encrypted and are recorded. I think WHCA does, the White House Communication Agency, like in military. Particularly they’ll travel with POTUS, which I’m used to traveling with. I don’t know if they were here for DPD. I’m not sure. This is my first DPD advance.
Pages 154-155
HSGAC Majority: Did you use your personal cellphone that day?
Witness: I didn’t have my personal cellphone with me.
…
HSGAC Majority: And on page 1484, it looks like you wrote in this email from August 5th that you attempted to call 6:20 – I imagine that was 6:20 p.m. – it says, “I believe I attempted a call (redacted) while still on the barn roof. He did not answer.” Was that 6:20 p.m. on the 13th?
Witness: Yes, yes. That would be p.m.
HSGAC Majority: Do you know who that was that’s redacted there, who you attempted to call?
…
Page 156
Witness: Okay, it was [Hercules 2] from the other team, the other team on page 2.
HSGAC Majority: Why did you attempt to call with your personal cellphone?
The guy is so busted!
Page 176
PSI Majority: So I guess just to come back to my colleague [HSGAC Majority] question of what failures there were. You know, the protectee survived but just based off of Crooks having faulty aim. And a man did die in the stands, and others were injured. Do you feel that there was a failure from the counter snipers’ perspective to mitigate this?
Witness: From my perspective, as being a counter sniper, I believe we did our job. We did our job well. When we found the target, we neutralized the threat.
The jerk never backs off this. They let Crooks (or whoever) take 8 shots, then they kill him so that he can’t be questioned. He put Hercules 2 team in a spot that was blocked, and helped put the local snipers in a room without a view of the roof. Trump only survived by luck or the hand of God. But hey, they did their job!
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Pages 178-179
PSI Minority (Ron Johnson’s assistant) How long did [Hercules 1] have Mr. Crooks in his sights before firing?
Witness: Mere seconds. Typically, the way we train was once you have the target in your sight you become the shooter. Ideally, I would be able to see the same target, and I would give him a wind call. After my wind call, it’s up to to take the shot when he’s ready. I would say at the same time, “I got him,” center, send it, gunshot. So four seconds, five seconds, at most.
The interval between shot 3 and the counter sniper’s shot was considerably longer than 5 seconds. More like 13 or 14 seconds.
Pages 181-182
PSI Minority: So why not, in that moment, send a signal or a radio call, saying, “Do not let the protectee on the stage,” or if the protectee was already on the stage, take him off?
Witness: At that time we didn’t know what we were working with. Obviously, police are running towards a situation. That could be anything from a medical situation to potentially a man with a gun or some sort of violent situation. We didn’t know what we were having, and I didn’t have enough to go over the radio with the same exact communication of “the police are working a situation at the three o’clock.” We know they’re working. What are they working on? We don’t know. We’re trying not to clog the radio.
PSI Minority: Understood. You mentioned you saw someone with their gun drawn.
The guy is so busted, and for once, the attorney actually goes in for the kill.
Page 183
PSI Minority: Did the thought even cross your mind that you should inform someone to keep the protectee from going on stage, or, if he was already on stage, take him back? Did that thought even cross your mind?
Witness: The thought did not cross my mind. It was more find out what’s happening, figure out what’s happening. Can we help? Can we take action?
The thought did not cross his mind. Yeah right. /sarc
Pages 187-188 Both members of Hercules 1 were placed on Admin leave
Page 198
PSI Minority: Okay. So we’ve got about three hours 14 and 45 minutes between when you arrive. In that 3 hours 15 and 45 minutes you had no time to go to the local Command 16 Post.
The attorney is nailing him on not picking up the local’s radio over a period of more than 3 hours. When the agent gives excuses about all he had to do, the attorney asks if he could have had someone else run the radio over to him. The agent says he never thought of that.
Page 220
Witness: Typically we went as close as we could to the stage, and we both kind of situated there. It wasn’t a decision of who did what. [D. King] got there first, so he was closer to the edge, and then I was next in.
So the team leader was further away from the edge of the barn.
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As far as I’m aware, the call came across PDOps4, the ESU channel, originally of the shooter being down. I imagine Mikulan being present on stage would at least give us an avenue of communication for this information then being passed to SS, even if it did not cross from ESU channels to SS ones.
Why more likely implying how, but still, yes very much seems self-incriminating.
I too find this interesting, not necessarily for the fact that the junior guy is the team lead, as that is how you get the experience of performing that role, but really the way he makes that a significant point here is rather unsettling.
//
In another direction, rolling back through some bodycam footage I found something that caught my interest:
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Another angle and image on BuC Sheriff Car 4.
I came across this image and a whole bunch of other images of PA police vehicles whilst trying to figure out what these were:
Any ideas?
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If I had to guess and start looking somewhere, perhaps one of the emergency services or possibly fire departments. They don’t have a police look to them.
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