(Ken Silva, Headline USA) In a documentary released Friday on Fox Nation, Adams Township Police Department Sgt. Aaron Zaliponi spoke for the first time publicly about taking the first shot at would-be assassin Thomas Crooks at the July 13 Trump rally.
Zaliponi’s heroics were first revealed by Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., who identified him at a Sept. 26 congressional hearing. According to Higgins, Zaliponi’s shot may have hit Crooks’s rifle—which stopped him after eight shots, allowing the Secret Service to put the kill shot in him about 10 seconds later.
BREAKING: Rep. Clay Higgins identified the heroic local cop who first shot at Thomas Crooks as Adams Township PD Sgt. Aaron Zaliponi
I Googled Zaliponi and this appears to be him
"Sgt. Aaron Zaliponi, an infantry squad leader, with 56th Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 28th… pic.twitter.com/Gv0TKLZFQF
— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) September 26, 2024
Crooks could have arguably shot 10 or more times if not for Zaliponi.
On the new Fox Nation documentary, Zaliponi, a member of the Butler ESU, recounted what he did to stop the Trump shooter.
“I fired the ninth shot. After the first volley, that’s when I was able to see Crooks up on the rooftop. At that point, I shouldered my rifle and engaged the threat. He immediately goes down—staggered, slumped over. There’s a very distinct movement: Based on my experience, he wasn’t retreating or getting out of the way,” he said.
“I knew I hit him and mortally wounded him. At that point, I could still see the top of his head moving around the roofline. As he slowly came back up, I was still on target, but not enough to engage yet. Once he got to about his mouth level, just as I was about to press the second round off, the Secret Service Hercules Unit engaged in that one shot,” he said.
While Zaliponi is convinced he hit Crooks, the medical examiner who conducted the autopsy on Crooks have both denied that Zaliponi hit the gunman. The FBI has also stated that it has “no forensic evidence indicating that [the round fired by the local officer] either struck our subject or the subject’s rifle.”
But in the Fox Nation documentary, Butler ESU Commander Ed Lenz noted the obvious: Crooks stopped shooting after Zaliponi returned fire, so his shot must have hit something.
“You don’t shoot ‘one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight—and then just stop,” Lenz said.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
