FBI releases images of person of interest in Kirk killing

11 Sep 2025, 17:33 by New York Times · Star-Advertiser

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FBI via NEW YORK TIMES

This image released by the FBI’s Salt Lake City bureau on Sept. 11 shows a person of interest the agency is seeking in the investigation into the killing of the right-wing activist Charlie Kirk. Kirk was killed by a single gunshot fired from an elevated position as he spoke to a large crowd at an outdoor space on Wednesday, police said.

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FBI via NEW YORK TIMES

This image released by the FBI’s Salt Lake City bureau on Sept. 11 shows a person of interest the agency is seeking in the investigation into the killing of the right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.

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Body of Charlie Kirk is transported aboard Air Force Two

Grainy images of a slim figure climbing a staircase. An old-model bolt-action rifle recovered in a wooded area. And a footprint.

Investigators said today that they were piecing together these clues and others in the hunt for the killer of Charlie Kirk, the conservative social media star and close ally of President Donald Trump who was fatally shot Wednesday as he was addressing a crowd at a university in Utah.

Two images of what investigators described as a person of interest were released Thursday showing a person in a black shirt, a baseball cap and dark sunglasses.

The killing of Kirk at the campus of Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, brought already ruptured political discourse in the United States to a breaking point, with politicians canceling events out of fear for their safety and multiple right-wing voices evoking a partisan “war.”

As a measure of Kirk’s influence in the Trump administration, Vice President JD Vance and his wife, Usha Vance, flew to Salt Lake City on Thursday to meet with Kirk’s family and close friends. Kirk’s casket was to be flown on Air Force Two to Phoenix, according to an official familiar with the matter.

Kirk, 31, lived in Scottsdale, Arizona, outside Phoenix.

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Trump said Thursday that he would award Kirk a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States, at a ceremony in the days ahead.

A trailblazer in the new Christian right and a divisive star of conservative politics, Kirk was shot in the neck by an assailant who university officials say was perched on a building around 150 yards away.

The suspect “appears to be of college age,” Beau Mason, the commissioner of Utah’s Department of Public Safety, told reporters Thursday morning.

Teams of officers scoured the suburban neighborhood near the university as helicopters searched from the sky Wednesday. One neighbor recounted that police officers had peered into her chicken coop with flashlights. But by late Thursday, law enforcement activity in the area appeared to dwindle. The Department of Public Safety said in a news release Thursday afternoon — more than 24 hours after the shooting — that they had received more than 200 tips and were investigating “multiple leads.”

Investigators said they found a palm imprint, a forearm imprint and a “footwear impression” they said they believed were from the suspect.

The person who killed Kirk appeared to arrive near the campus at 11:52 a.m., Mason said, about half an hour before the attack. The police were able to track the suspect’s movements onto campus, through stairwells to a roof and to the “shooting location.” At the time of the shooting, video footage showed a person running from a rooftop.

Thursday afternoon, the FBI posted a reward of up to $100,000 for information leading to the identification and arrest of Kirk’s assassin.

But the investigation began with several miscues.

On Wednesday, FBI Director Kash Patel raised expectations of a speedy end to the search by congratulating state, local and federal officials for taking into custody “the subject for the horrific shooting.”

Two hours later, Patel announced that authorities had released the man. “Our investigation continues,” he wrote. Patel and his top deputy were headed to Utah on Thursday to more directly oversee the hunt for the killer, officials said.

The Utah Department of Public Safety said in a statement late Wednesday that investigators had initially detained George Zinn as a suspect, a man whose image widely circulated on social media during his arrest. A second suspect, Zachariah Qureshi, was taken into custody and released after interrogation with law enforcement, the department said. “There are no current ties to the shooting with either of these individuals,” the statement said.

Among the repercussions of the mistaken arrests were online threats made toward Michael Mallinson, a 77-year-old retired banker who lives in Toronto and who happened to have a passing resemblance to Zinn.

In the frantic aftermath of the shooting, Mallinson’s photo had begun circulating on the internet, erroneously labeling him as a suspect.

Even before a suspect and a motive were identified, many right-wing influencers were quick Thursday to blame Democrats for Kirk’s shooting. Some called for crackdowns and retaliation.

“Make no mistake — we are at war,” said Alex Jones, the right-wing commentator who frequently elevates conspiracy theories and promotes hatred toward the left.

Chaya Raichik, a right-wing internet celebrity best known for her popular Libs of TikTok account on the social media platform X, posted a similar message: “This is war.”

Some were even more explicit. Matt Forney, a right-wing journalist known for racist and misogynistic content, said it was time for “a complete crackdown on the left.”

“Every Democratic politician must be arrested and the party banned,” Forney wrote on social media.

The fiery rhetoric appeared to have immediate consequences. Democratic leaders in Utah urged state lawmakers to cancel any public events scheduled for the weekend after receiving what they described as angry and menacing messages. Rep. Angela Romero, the House minority leader, said she had canceled her weekend plans for a door-knocking canvass to discuss redistricting with voters.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said she had rescheduled a planned rally in North Carolina both out of respect for Kirk and because of security concerns.

U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., and Daniele Monroe-Moreno, chair of the Nevada State Democratic Party, announced Thursday that a town hall scheduled for Saturday in Las Vegas would be postponed “out of an abundance of caution for town hall participants, attendees, and members of the media.”

Here’s what else to know:

>> The weapon: The gun discovered near campus was an older-model Mauser 30-06 caliber high-powered bolt-action rifle, according to three federal law enforcement officials based on a preliminary internal assessment. The weapon and several recovered cartridges are being traced by Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives analysts, but the evidence has not yet led to a person of interest, they said.

>> Heightened fears: Kirk’s killing, the latest in a string of attacks targeting American political figures, intensified fears that political violence is becoming normalized in a highly polarized nation. On the floor of the House of Representatives on Wednesday, a request for a moment of silence for Kirk devolved into bitter partisanship.

>> Trump casts blame: Trump blamed the rhetoric of the “radical left” for Kirk’s killing, but investigators in Utah did not assign any possible motive to the gunman. Kirk promoted beliefs including that the benefits of gun rights outweighed the lives lost to gun violence, and that nonwhite immigrants would soon displace white Americans.

>> Commentator fired: MSNBC has fired Matthew Dowd, a political analyst who said on-air that Kirk had pushed hate speech, adding that “hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions.” Dowd later apologized on social media.

>> Pressure on Patel: Kash Patel, the FBI director, congratulated officials for taking into custody “the subject for the horrific shooting” on Wednesday. He was forced to backtrack on social media after the person was cleared and released. The reversal was a source of significant embarrassment for the FBI director on a day when three former agents filed a lawsuit portraying him as a partisan neophyte.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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