Local police officers who were pulled up to the edge of a roof to find the would-be assassin of former President Donald Trump are not responsible for the carnage that occurred, Butler County Mayor Edward Natali said during a television appearance. Breitbart News DailyHe explained that the mainstream media has not accurately portrayed what really happened.
The news has been filled with stories of unnamed local police officers who encountered Thomas Crooks’ family before the shooting and who have been blamed for it primarily, but Natali said that’s not fair and the stories aren’t accurate.
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He explained that seven officers from the Butler Township Police Department were “there strictly for traffic control.”
“The Secret Service, Pennsylvania State Police, Butler County Sheriff’s Office and Butler County Police were solely responsible for traffic control and I’m not going to comment on the other entities that were there, but I want to set the record straight,” he said, referring to many comments placing the blame on local officers.
“I want to talk about my officer, he wasn’t up on the ladder. He was in no position to engage the suspect at all,” he said, explaining that officers on the ground were holding him up with their hands cupped so they could investigate what was going on on the roof.
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“He’s peeking his head in to see where the suspect is,” he said, explaining that the suspect spotted him with his hands on the roof.
“The suspect pointed the rifle at my officer’s head. He was clearly in no position to engage the officers no matter what and he did not back down,” he revealed.
“It’s not that I didn’t want to engage,” he said, explaining that he was unable to engage because he took his hands off the roof to grab his gun, falling backwards and being injured in the process.
“He let go of the roof to grab his gun and of course fell backwards and was actually injured in the process,” Natali said, adding that he believed it was likely that officers who encountered the suspect “maybe moved faster, forcing him to fire.”
“Unfortunately someone died, but I believe he saved a life by getting President Trump to hurry and not shoot as accurately as possible,” he said, emphasizing that local police also did not have jurisdiction over the building.
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“It’s still under investigation. I can certainly say that the building was discussed earlier this week. That was confirmed to me. I wasn’t directly involved in all the preparations, but my team had a very good operational plan for that day, and it was all about traffic control,” he said, explaining that while he didn’t want to place blame, Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle’s excuses about the slope of the roof were ridiculous.
“I haven’t measured it, but the slope of that roof appears to be greater than the slope of the roof at the HDR facility. … I’ve heard about incompetence, ineptitude, and so on, on your show,” he said. “Maybe it’s Peter’s Principle. Maybe she should get back to guarding Pepsi bottles instead of guarding the president. This is kind of mean, and it’s not something I would normally do, but God forbid.”
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