Judge Aileen Cannon, of the Federal District Court in Fort Pierce (Florida), sentenced Ryan Routh, 59, to life in prison this Wednesday for trying to kill Donald Trump in 2024 on a golf course in Florida, which was the Republican’s second assassination attempt while he was a candidate for the presidency of the United States.
Routh, who works at a construction renovation company in North Carolina, was arrested in September 2024, two months before the elections in which the Republican once again ran for president of the country.
A Secret Service agent saw the barrel of an AK-47 rifle poke out of some bushes behind the fence of Trump’s golf club in West Palm Beach (Florida), while the magnate was playing about 500 meters away. According to the current president of the United States, the agent fired in the direction of the canyon while running towards the place.
The man was found guilty last September by a court of 12 jurors in an unusual trial in which the defendant chose to represent himself. When he heard the jury deliberating him guilty, he picked up a pen and tried to stab him in the neck. If it had not been for law enforcement officers, he would have ended his life. Since then he was waiting to find out the extent of the sentence.
“American democracy does not work when individuals take the initiative to eliminate candidates. That is what this individual attempted to do,” Assistant U.S. Attorney John Shipley told the judge, according to AP.
Routh was convicted of several crimes: attempted murder of a presidential candidate, using a firearm to commit a crime, assaulting a federal agent, possessing a firearm to commit a crime, and using a weapon with an altered serial number. “He remains unrepentant for his crimes, never apologized for the lives he put at risk, and his life demonstrates an almost total disregard for the law,” the prosecution stated.
Prosecutors said Routh spent weeks plotting to kill Trump. “The crimes for which Routh was convicted reflect meticulous conspiracy, exhaustive premeditation, and a cowardly disregard for human life,” prosecutors wrote. On September 15, 2024, the convicted man took cover behind some bushes on the West Palm Beach golf course to try to kill Trump.
