Conservative influencer Charlie Kirk was shot and killed with a single gunshot in front of thousands of college students on Sept. 10. On the morning of Sept. 12, President Donald Trump announced a suspect was in custody.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox identified the suspect as 22-year-old Tyler Robinson. He was taken into custody after a family member contacted authorities and said Robinson had “confessed to them or implied that he committed the incident.”
The annnouncement comes after days of intense investigation, video analysis and searches. Video released Thursday night showed a person running across the roof of the building where the shot came from. FBI agents recovered what they described as “a high-powered, bolt-action rifle” from a wooded area behind a building at Utah Valley University, where Kirk, 31, was talking to students as part of his “American Comeback Tour.”
What rifle was used to kill Charlie Kirk?
Where many public shootings in recent years have used an AR-15 or other firearms modified to simulate automatic fire, the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, citing law-enforcement sources, reported that the recovered firearm was an older model Mauser .30-06 caliber bolt action rifle.
An ATF spokesperson declined to comment to USA TODAY, citing the active investigation.
What is a bolt action rifle?
An example of a bolt action rifle.
A bolt action rifle is one that requires the user to manually reload every time he or she wants to fire, generally by using a handle on the side that allows the marksman to pull the rifle’s bolt back, cock the weapon, eject spent or unwanted cartridges or shells, and then load a new round when the bolt handle is pushed back forward.
Most bolt action rifles have an internal magazine holding three to five rounds of ammunition, depending on the size of the cartridges. Investigators also found several cartridges, including a spent round in the rifle’s chamber, in the woods behind the university, according to the New York Times.
Bolt action rifles do not have the speed of semi-automatic rifles such as the AR-15, which use a mechanism to chamber new rounds.
However, bolt action rifles are also considered to be more accurate and less prone to malfunctions, they can accommodate a wide selection of cartridges, and they tend to be less expensive.
The National Rifle Association calls bolt action “the quintessential rifle action for military, hunting and target-shooting applications.”
Are bolt action rifles legal in Florida?
Yes. Bolt action rifles are common. You do have to be over 21 to buy a rifle in Florida, raised from 18 after the Parkland school shooting, and you must be legally eligible to buy a firearm. Law enforcement officers, correctional officers and service members may still buy rifles from the age of 18 and up.
Bills to lower the minimum age back to 18 or remove it entirely failed in the Florida Legislature this year.
There is a waiting period of three days and buyers must pass a background check, but no permit is necessary.
Who killed Charlie Kirk?
Trump did not provide a name in the interview with “Fox and Friends” when he announced that law enforcement had a suspect in custody.
“We have him,” Trump said in a the Fox News Channel interview.
However, Gov. Cox identified him as Robinson.
Trump said that someone close to the suspect turned him in.
“Somebody that was very close to him said that’s him,” Trump said. “The person that was involved was a person of faith, a minister.”
Contributors: Thao Nguyen, Jeanine Santucci and Joey Garrison, USA TODAY
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Who killed Charlie Kirk? Weapon ID’d as a Mauser bolt action rifle