Ryan W. Routh, suspected of trying to assassinate Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course, stands handcuffed after his arrest throughout a visitors cease close to Palm City, Florida, U.S., September 15, 2024.
Martin County Sheriff’s Office | Via Reuters
The trial of Ryan Wesley Routh got here to a dramatic finish Tuesday when he began stabbing himself in the neck with a pen after a Florida jury found him guilty of trying to assassinate Donald Trump final yr on a golf course.
After simply two-and-half hours of deliberations, the panel additionally found Routh guilty of assaulting the Secret Service agent who rousted him from his hiding place and guilty of three federal gun fees stemming from the Sept. 15, 2024, incident.
Routh, who had pleaded not guilty to all the fees, now faces life in jail when he’s sentenced.
The verdict got here in not lengthy after Routh capped his two-week trial, throughout which he served as his personal lawyer, by delivering a quick and disjointed closing argument throughout which he tried to argue that there was no crime as a result of he by no means fired a shot at Trump.
But simply 12 minutes into his monologue, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon interrupted Routh and scolded him for ignoring her order to “stay within the bounds of the case” after he began complaining that he wasn’t allowed to place extra witnesses on the stand.
With the jury out of earshot, Routh then requested Cannon whether or not the general public defenders who initially represented him, Kristy Militello and Renee Michelle Sihvola, may wrap up his closing argument if the decide interrupted him once more.
Cannon stated no, and when the jury returned Routh argued that “to merely have a weapon in the presence of another does not mean intent.”
But after Routh introduced up the Jan. 6 riot on Capitol Hill and started speaking about Ukraine, founding father Patrick Henry and the “common man,” Cannon put a halt to his argument. In complete, Routh spoke for about 42 minutes.
A 59-year-old Hawaii resident and former Trump supporter, Routh is charged with trying to assassinate a serious presidential candidate and assaulting a federal officer, plus a number of firearm violations.
The authorities delivered its closing argument first, with prosecutor Christopher Browne telling the courtroom that the suspect had deliberate to kill Trump “for a long, long time.”
“It is not every case where the defendant writes his intent down on a piece of paper,” Browne stated throughout his closing assertion.
Browne was referring to notice Routh wrote earlier than he was arrested. It was addressed “To the World” and said plainly, “This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump.”
“This is not a whodunit,” Browne instructed jurors.
Starting with the pretrial hearings and all through the trial in federal courtroom right here, Routh was admonished repeatedly by Cannon for disrupting the proceedings and asking witnesses questions that the decide deemed exterior the scope of the case or irrelevant.
Courtroom sketch for Ryan Routh
Artist: Lothar Speer
On Monday, Routh requested his personal ballistics knowledgeable, Michael McClay, “Does it take a special kind of person to be able to take another person’s life?” Cannon known as for a break earlier than McClay may reply and later instructed Routh the query was “far outside the bounds.”
Routh known as two character witnesses on the stand who testified that he was not violent and is a “jolly person.” After that, Routh introduced, “I will not testify.”
When Cannon requested the accused man if he had sufficient time to assume this momentous determination by way of, Routh answered, “A year.”
Routh was arrested after a Secret Service agent noticed him hiding in the shrubbery close to the fifth gap of the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach and, in keeping with prosecutors, ready for Trump to get into his line of fireside.
Routh, who will not be a lawyer, requested Cannon at a listening to in July for permission to characterize himself after clashing along with his court-appointed attorneys, saying they had been “a million miles apart.”
Cannon reluctantly agreed, calling it a “bad idea,” however ordered the general public defenders to remain in the courtroom on standby and ordered Routh to not method the witnesses.
Federal prosecutors known as 38 witnesses over a span of seven days who positioned Routh on the scene and testified that the suspect may have killed Trump had he not been caught.
Routh known as three witnesses and was finished presenting his case earlier than lunchtime Monday.
The closing arguments got here two days after Trump spoke at a memorial service for the popular-but-polarizing conservative activist Charlie Kirk, whose homicide on a Utah faculty campus earlier this month has ratcheted-up anxieties about political violence in the United States.
Cannon was appointed to the bench by Trump and is similar decide who dismissed the fees towards the president after he was accused of mishandling labeled paperwork at his residence at Mar-a-Lago.
Juliette Arcodia reported from Fort Pierce, and Corky Siemaszko from New York City.