FLORIDA: The man accused of hiding with a gun near Donald Trump's Florida golf course in an apparent attempt to kill the former president wrote a letter months earlier describing an “assassination attempt” and offering a bounty on Trump's life, US prosecutors said Monday.
Ryan Routh, 58, has been charged with two firearms offenses after he allegedly pointed a rifle through the tree line on Sept. 15 while the Republican presidential candidate was golfing at his West Palm Beach course, according to a criminal complaint.
He has not yet filed a return.
Routh is due to appear at a hearing scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT) on Monday where prosecutors will ask a judge to keep him in jail until his trial.
In a court filing released ahead of the hearing, prosecutors said that several months before the incident, Routh left a handwritten letter addressed “to the world” offering a bounty on Trump.
“This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump, but I failed,” the suspect wrote, according to the file. “I will offer $150,000 to whoever can complete the job.”
The letter was found in a box delivered by an unidentified civilian witness that also included ammunition, a metal pipe and four phones, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors also said that when Routh was arrested this month, his car contained a handwritten list with dates from August, September and October of places where Trump had appeared or was expected to appear.
They said a search of their cellphone records showed the devices had pinged towers near the Trump International golf course where the incident occurred and near the Mar-a-Lago resort where Trump lives.
Routh has been charged with possession of a firearm as a convicted felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. More charges could be forthcoming.
Authorities have not yet released a motive for the incident, which the FBI says is being investigated as an apparent assassination attempt on Trump ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential election.
In a self-published book published in 2023, Routh wrote that Iran was “free to assassinate Trump” for withdrawing the United States from an international nuclear deal with Tehran during his presidency.
