Northeast
Trump assassination attempt: New texts show local police scramble to assist with covering rally
New texts between members of Beaver County emergency services in Pennsylvania show just how understaffed they were ahead of a rally for former President Trump earlier this month when a would-be assassin shot him and others, killing a spectator.
In a discussion between team leaders at the emergency services, who were requested to assist with the rally in nearby Butler County where the event took place, several unnamed people discussed their lack of available workers.
According to one leader, his team was busy and could not work the rally, remarking that “everyone else is either working, on vacation or hurt,” in texts provided to Fox News Digital by the office of Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.
The senator’s office revealed an overview of all records received by Grassley regarding the attempted assassination on Monday.
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A screenshot of text messages obtained in the investigation of the July 13 attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump. (Obtained by Senator Chuck Grassley )
Text messages between the team leaders of the Beaver County emergency services unit showed that they were asked to assist Butler County with security for the Trump event only days before the rally. A message was sent to team leaders on July 8, asking who would be available to help for the July 13 event.
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“It is probably going to be a 12 [hour] detail. Right now I am looking for 6 guys available. If absolutely needed we can split the shift,” a text to the leaders read.
At one point, someone said they may tell Butler County, where Trump’s rally took place, that the emergency services from Beaver County may need to be “on call” instead.
A diagram illustrates approximate coverage areas by local sniper teams from both Beaver and Butler counties at the rally for former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024. The former president was shot at in an assassination attempt at the rally, resulting in the death of one of the rally goers. (Provided by Senator Chuck Grassley )
In a planning diagram, the locations of various snipers for Butler County and Beaver County can be seen. The approximate coverage of each sniper team was labeled, with each focused on the area surrounding where the stage would be.
However, would-be assassin Thomas Crooks’ location on top of a warehouse owned by AGR International was not included in the area covered by snipers. His placement is detailed in an after-action report from Beaver County, which reiterated the position of their sniper, not far from Crooks’ position.
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A Beaver or Butler County sniper position is in place at the rally for former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. The former president was shot in an assassination attempt at the rally. (Provided by Senator Chuck Grassley )
The documentation compiled by Grassley also demonstrated the sightings of Crooks, and observation of his suspicious behavior leading up to the shooting that evening.
Roughly an hour before the attempted assassination, snipers noticed Crooks, reporting that he was sitting at a picnic table nearby.
“I did see him with a range finder looking towards the stage,” a text to a group chat of multi-county snipers read at 5:38 p.m. “If you wanna notify [Secret Service] snipers to look out. I lost sight of him.”
The author of the message also said a bike and a backpack had appeared in the building’s rear.
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Photographs of Crooks and the bike and backpack were exchanged by local police over text message.
Photo of Thomas Matthew Crooks. Crooks is alleged to be the shooter in the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday, July 13, 2024. (Obtained by Fox News Digital)
Just minutes before Crooks opened fire, the local officers assisting with the event weren’t sure where he had gone.
One person responded, “not sure” when asked what direction Crooks had traveled in. “He was up against the building,” they wrote at 6:00 p.m. “If I had to guess towards the back. Away from the event.”
Five minutes later, it was communicated over the radio that the suspect was at the picnic tables and moving towards Sheetz with a backpack. Between 6:06 and 6:12, an individual, the name of whom is redacted in the after-action report, attempted to tell patrol officers about Crooks’ presence around the building on the side of the fairgrounds.
But at 6:12 p.m., shots were fired.
Grassley’s office indicated that his oversight of the attempted assassination is ongoing.
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New York
Man Sentenced to 115 Years for Killing N.Y.P.D. Officer in Queens
A man was sentenced to 115 years in prison on Monday for the fatal shooting of a New York City police officer who had ordered him to step out of a car in Queens in 2024.
More than 200 people, mostly police officers, packed a courtroom in State Supreme Court in Queens to hear Justice Michael Aloise sentence Guy Rivera in the killing of Jonathan Diller, 31, who was promoted to the rank of detective after his death.
“It took me five minutes to calculate these numbers,” Justice Aloise said. “It’s going to take you a lifetime to calculate the damage you did and the grief that you caused.”
He said that Mr. Rivera had determined his own fate “the second you pulled that trigger.”
Detective Diller’s wife, Stephanie, who sat among the officers in the courtroom, read a statement in court just before the sentencing, speaking of the pain and loss that she and her son, Ryan, now 3, have suffered. Ms. Diller, who testified during the trial, spoke directly to Mr. Rivera as he sat at the defense table.
“This is the last moment I will allow you to take from me,” she said as tears rolled down her cheeks. “You took my husband, Jonathan. You took the future we planned together. The life we were building, the years we were supposed to share together.”
“What you did to Jonathan” she said, “gave me and our son a life sentence without him.”
A jury found Mr. Rivera, 36, guilty earlier this month on four charges, including aggravated manslaughter, in Detective Diller’s death, but acquitted him of the most serious charge, first-degree murder. The decision, after a three-week trial in Queens, stunned the dozens of police officers present when it was announced in the courtroom on April 1.
To find him guilty of murder, the jury had to decide whether they believed Mr. Rivera had intended to kill Detective Diller when he pointed his gun at him in the Far Rockaway section of Queens on March 25, 2024. They ultimately determined that Mr. Rivera had intentionally pulled the trigger, but did not intend to kill him.
Mr. Rivera did not speak at his sentencing at the advice of one of his lawyers, Jamal Johnson, who told Justice Aloise they would appeal the conviction.
Mr. Johnson, a lawyer with the Legal Aid Society, said after the hearing that Justice Aloise’s statement at sentencing showed the court “had already made up its mind about sentencing well before the trial was conducted.”
During the trial, prosecutors said that before the fatal shooting, Detective Diller’s partner, Sgt. Sasha Rosen, saw Mr. Rivera and another man, Lindy Jones, come out of a store and get into a car. Mr. Rivera had an L-shaped object in the pocket of his sweatshirt that resembled a firearm, prosecutors said.
Detective Diller approached the vehicle and asked Mr. Rivera repeatedly to comply with orders. When he did not, Sergeant Rosen reached in to pull him out of the car.
Then Mr. Rivera fired, the jury found. The defense argued that Mr. Rivera’s gun went off accidentally when Sergeant Rosen pulled him out, striking Detective Diller. Prosecutors said Mr. Rivera then turned his gun on Sergeant Rosen, but the weapon jammed.
Justice Aloise did not allow the jury to see video that, the defense contended, showed Mr. Rivera’s arm was broken during his confrontation with the police.
That evidence would have directly undermined the prosecution’s contention that Mr. Rivera was physically able to pull the trigger when he tried to shoot Sergeant Rosen, they said.
In all, Mr. Rivera was sentenced to 25 years to life for the aggravated manslaughter conviction; 40 years to life for the attempted murder of Sergeant Rosen; and 25 years to life for each of the gun possession counts. He was ordered to serve those sentences consecutively.
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On Monday, after the sentencing, dozens of police officers smiled and embraced one another as they left the courtroom. The prosecutors who tried the case and Melinda Katz, the Queens district attorney, hugged several of Detective Diller’s family members.
Jessica Tisch, the police commissioner, called the sentence “obviously the right result, for him and for anyone who kills a New York City police officer.”
Outside the courthouse, members of the Police Benevolent Association, the police officers’ union, said they were pleased with the sentence.
“The verdict in this case did not send the right message to the Diller family and every police officer who wears the uniform,” said Patrick Hendry, the union president, who spoke at the foot of the courthouse stairwell, backed by nearly 100 police officers.
“But this sentence,” he said, “it sent the right message.”
Boston, MA
Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” musical returns to Boston for first time in 25 years
Say bonjour to the return of “Beauty and the Beast.” The national tour has been in Boston before, but this is the first time in 25 years that Disney is behind the production.
Kyra Belle Johnson stars as Belle, the bookworm who doesn’t quite fit into her quiet village.
“I think part of treating her like a real person is finding the humor and finding the faults and breathing and being present on stage every night,” Johnson said.
As Mrs. Potts, Kathy Voytko embodies the beloved teapot.
“When I was talking to my daughters about, ‘How do you feel about mom being gone for the better part of a year?’ They said, ‘Well, geez, mom, we’re gonna miss you, but it’s Mrs. Potts,’” Voytko explained.
The actors told WBZ-TV that Disney’s involvement in this tour makes a noticeable impact, with Voytko saying, “There is nothing like a Disney-produced Disney production because the magic in the show, the attention to detail, the loving recreation of the movie that we all know and love, plus some elements of surprise.”
Johnson added, “They care about this piece of art so much… And they’re really precious with it, but at the same time, they’re open with it.”
Book writer Linda Woolverton worked with the cast in the rehearsal room to make sure the piece felt modern.
“She literally changed some scenes and lines specifically for us and our versions of these characters to make it seem grounded and real,” Johnson explained.
And Johnson gained extra insight into Belle’s life by visiting the Alsace region of France, which inspired the original Disney animators.
“Walking in the town and having like a storefront and then the leaning building that was this like blue and the wooden windows and somebody leaning out of it talking to somebody on the street. These are real places, it’s not just like a made-up place in your head.”
The wonder she felt is echoed in the audience’s response.
“This is a gate for a lot of new theater lovers. We get a lot of people who this is their first show,” said Johnson.
“It’s for everybody,” added Voytko. “It’s for adults, it’s for married couples, it is for a date night, it for a pack of pals who just want to see something nostalgic from their youth and it makes it a thrill for us every single day.”
You can see Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” at the Citizens Opera House in Boston through Sunday.
Pittsburg, PA
NFL Draft in Pittsburgh sets onsite attendance record, third-best viewership mark
A historic number of people flooded into Pittsburgh for the NFL Draft on Thursday.
Around 320,000 fans attended the opening round of the draft on Thursday night just outside of Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh, which marked an attendance record for round one of the draft, ESPN announced on Monday afternoon. In total, about 805,000 people attended the three-day event.
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ESPN also said that about 13,2 million people tuned in to watch the first round of the NFL Draft on Thursday night, which made it the third-most watched opening round under the current format, which started back in 2010. Only the 2025 and 2020 editions of the draft drew a bigger audience on the first night.
The league said that a record amount of merchandise was sold throughout the NFL Draft weekend, too, though it did not provide a figure or metric there. The previous record on that front was set last season in Green Bay.
The Las Vegas Raiders used the No. 1 overall pick on Indiana quarterback and reigning Heisman Trophy winner Fernando Mendoza on Thursday night. Mendoza, who led the Hoosiers to the national championship earlier this year, was not in attendance in Pittsburgh. Instead, he celebrated with his family from home in Miami.
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The NFL Draft will be held next spring in Washington D.C. for the first time in modern history. It’s expected to be held on the National Mall. Washington D.C. held the draft one other time back in December 1940.
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