Charlie Kirk shooting suspect ‘confessed to assassination online’ before turning himself in
Tyler Robinson is suspected of shooting right-wing activist Charlie Kirk to death at Utah Valley University (Picture: AFP/Getty Images)
The man suspected of assassinating conservative activist Charlie Kirk appears to have confessed in an online chat two hours before turning himself in.
A Discord account belonging to the suspect, Tyler Robinson, 22, contained a chilling message that two sources shared with The Washington Post on Monday.
‘Hey guys, I have bad news for you all,’ states the message that was sent Thursday night.
‘It was me at UVU yesterday. im sorry for all of this.’
Charlie Kirk shooting suspect Tyler Robinson was arrested on Thursday after a 33-hour manhunt (Picture: Shutterstock)
Later that night, Robinson was taken into custody amid a hunt for the shooter who killed Kirk as he spoke to students at Utah Valley University on Wednesday afternoon.
Robinson’s account sent the message to a small private group, according to a source, and Discord has sent a copy of it to authorities.
Discord told the Post that they conducted an internal investigation and came up with ‘no evidence that the suspect planned this incident or promoted violence on Discord’.
The company is providing information on Robinson’s account and activities to the FBI and local law enforcement, the source added.
A screenshot taken from video footage released by the FBI on September 11 shows a person of interest running on the roof at Utah Valley University (Picture: Getty Images)
Robinson was arrested after one of his family members contacted a friend, who told law enforcement officials that Robinson confessed to the crime.
The group reportedly had 30 members and screenshots of people reacting to Kirk’s killing before the confession were also shared with the newspaper.
‘I just saw the video holy s***,’ one user wrote, saying of Kirk, ‘Bro didn’t deserve to go out like that sad.’
Robinson’s account responded with the ‘bad news’ message the next day.
Right-wing activist and commentator Charlie Kirk throws hats to the crowd shortly before he was shot at a Utah Valley University (Picture: Reuters)
‘im surrendering through a sheriff friend in a few moments,’ read the message posted at 7.57pm.
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‘thanks for all the good times and laughs, you’ve all been so amazing, thank you all for everything.’
The next day, a friend in the group chat wrote, ‘pray for Tyler and his repentance’.
It comes after The New York Times reported on a discussion in a different Discord chat in which Robinson joked that a ‘doppelgänger’ was trying to get him in trouble after images of a shooting suspect that were released looked like him.
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