Ryan Routh has pleaded not guilty in the attempted assassination of former president Donald Trump on September 15.
The 58-year-old staked out Donald Trump for 12 hours on his golf course in Florida and wrote of his desire to kill him, according to authorities.
Routh was initially charged with two federal firearms offences.
The upgraded charges contained in a five-count indictment reflect the Justice Department’s assessment that he methodically plotted to kill the Republican nominee, aiming a rifle through the shrubbery surrounding Trump’s West Palm Beach golf course on an afternoon Trump was playing on it.
Routh left behind a note in which he described his intention, prosecutors said.
Court records show the case has been assigned to Aileen Cannon, a Trump-appointed federal judge who generated intense scrutiny for her handling of a criminal case charging Trump with illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
She dismissed that case in July, a decision now being appealed by special counsel Jack Smith’s team.
The attempted assassination indictment had been foreshadowed during a court hearing Monday in which prosecutors successfully argued for Routh to remain behind bars as a flight risk and a threat to public safety.
They alleged that he had written of his plans to kill Trump in a handwritten note months before his Sept. 15 arrest in which he referred to his actions as a failed “assassination attempt on Donald Trump” and offered $150,000 for anyone who could “finish the job.” That note was in a box that Routh had apparently dropped off at the home of an unidentified witness months before his arrest.
After the attempted assassination, the person opened the box, took a photograph of the front page of the letter – addressed “Dear World” – and contacted law enforcement.
Prosecutors also said Routh kept in his car a handwritten list of venues at which Trump had appeared or was expected to be present in August, September and October.
The charge of attempted assassination of a major presidential candidate carries a potential life sentence in the event of a conviction. Other charges in the indictment include assaulting a federal officer, possessing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence and the two original firearms charges he faced last week.
