00:00:00.440The Stone Zone, entertaining and informative on the Red Apple Podcast Network.
00:00:07.540This is The Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
00:00:10.900People love him and respect him, Roger Stone.
00:00:13.620Now, get in the zone. It's The Stone Zone. Here's Roger Stone.
00:00:22.520Get ready to get stoned because you are now entering The Stone Zone.
00:00:28.440There's been a major historic update in the investigation into Thomas Matthew Crooks.
00:00:33.680That's the man that the federal government claims is responsible for firing eight rounds from a semi-automatic AR-15 style rifle at President Donald Trump during his July 2024 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in which the president was inches away from losing his life, having a bullet strike him and graze him on his ear.
00:00:56.960This is beyond belief, but the FBI, we have just learned, completely destroyed all evidence regarding Crooks prior to Donald Trump becoming president.
00:01:06.620We learned today that Crooks' body was cremated, although it's unclear whether his parents asked for such cremation.
00:01:16.000It is clear, according to the records released today, that an anonymous donor paid for that cremation.
00:01:23.120Information surrounding Crooks has been incomplete, to say the least, with authorities not releasing any real details about Crooks concerning his motives, the way in which he obtained his weapons, the communications he made prior to the shootings, or the background from which he came since the shooting in 2024.
00:01:41.980We also learned today that Thomas Matthew Cricks had mail-ordered gun parts using the alias Bob Dole.
00:01:53.240My old boss, I was staff assistant to Senator Bob Dole.
00:01:59.640A lot of parallels here because, of course, Lee Harvey Oswald mail-ordered his rifle using the name A.J. Heidel.
00:02:11.240JFK researchers have long thought that that was part of the setup of Lee Harvey Oswald.
00:02:18.260Other similarities here, it's kind of like Lee Harvey Oswald and the Kennedy assassination.
00:02:24.400In other words, I wonder whether we'll ever know what really happened in Butler, Pennsylvania,
00:02:31.100just as I wonder whether or not we'll ever know what really happened in Dallas, Texas on November 22nd, 1963.
00:02:39.280A lot of parallels here. For example, immediately after the shooting, the roof of the building from which Crooks allegedly shot was hosed down, very much like the way the limousine in which John F. Kennedy was shot was completely hosed out within hours of that shooting.
00:03:02.860As with Oswald, where the building should have been sealed, the building being the Texas School
00:03:10.440Book Depository Building and all the other surrounding buildings, including the Dow
00:03:14.840Tech's building, should have been searched, emptied, and sealed. They weren't. This was also
00:03:20.720the case in the building from which Crooks allegedly shot. The Secret Service excuse was that
00:03:27.980that building was not searched and seized because it had a slanted roof. Barely makes sense.
00:03:35.480President Trump made a statement on the status of the investigation into Crook's Butler assassination
00:03:40.620attempt yesterday. The president wrote on his true social feed that the Department of Justice
00:03:45.980under former President Joe Biden had largely deleted all information pertaining to Crook's
00:03:51.120or the assassination attempt before Trump himself took office in 2025.
00:04:19.780This was all part of a Democrat plot to get me out of the election that failed.
00:04:24.860Dirty cop Christopher Wray, that's the former FBI director, should pay a price for the way he handled this assassination attempt and make certain for the things he said.
00:04:34.520God bless America. Make America great again, President Donald J. Trump.0.63
00:04:38.740The president's comments came just hours after documents from the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by Senator Chuck Grassley, revealed that Thomas Matthew Crooks had his cremation paid for, as I said earlier, by an anonymous donor after his parents refused to pay for his cremation for financial reasons.
00:04:58.580That same report also revealed that Crooks, as I said, had ordered parts of his firearms through the mail using Bob Dole as a pseudonym at his home address.
00:05:11.760Now, I said on that day online and right here in the Stone Zone that I had heard from a Pennsylvania State police source, who I know to be reliable, that the shooter was not Thomas Matthew Crooks, but a man named Maxwell Yerick.
00:05:30.060I'll make it very clear. I'm not saying that Maxwell Yerrick is the shooter or was the shooter, but I am reporting that a credible source with the Pennsylvania State Police told me that Yerrick was a shooter.
00:05:45.960And when I looked Yerrick up online, I saw that he had a history of Antifa activism and that he had been arrested at a number of the other Trump events.
00:05:57.800so it does have a certain logic. I've been reporting on the anomalies surrounding Crooks
00:06:03.780and the assassination attempts since that fateful day in Butler in which there are many. Again the
00:06:09.020local officers from the Beaver County Emergency Services Unit counter snipers saw Crooks using a
00:06:15.900rangefinder and looking towards the stage before the rally in Butler began that day. They actually
00:06:21.360photographed him and radio texted their concern. One contemporaneous message around 5.38 p.m. said
00:06:29.100he was looking toward the stage with a device. FBI Director Christopher Wray testified that Crooks
00:06:36.100flew a DJI drone over the area around 3.50 to 4 p.m. Eastern, roughly two hours before the shooting
00:06:45.840for about 11 minutes. That was approximately 200 yards from the stage. He watched a live feed on
00:06:52.440the controller. The drone and the controller were later recovered from the car they said belonged
00:06:57.560to Crooks. But we know that the local police also offered the Secret Service to conduct a
00:07:05.400drone surveillance, and the Secret Service said that they would handle it. They didn't conduct
00:07:11.500a drone surveillance, largely because they couldn't figure out how to use the new technology.
00:07:19.560Crowds again pointed and shouted about a man on the roof for roughly two minutes before the shots.
00:07:25.340The AGR complex, that's the building that Crooks allegedly shot from, was left outside the Secret
00:07:31.620Service secure perimeter despite known line of sight to the stage. No one from any agency was
00:07:39.180assigned to the roof, local snipers inside the building thought the outer area and the roofs
00:07:44.640were somebody else's job. Approximately 22 seconds before Crooks fired, a Senate report found a local
00:07:52.480officer sent a radio alert that there was an armed individual on top of the building. That
00:07:58.540information, turns out, was not relayed to key Secret Service personnel who were interviewed by
00:08:04.260the Senate investigators. Senate panel also interviewed a Secret Service counter sniper
00:08:09.400who said that they saw officers with their guns drawn running towards the building where the
00:08:15.160shooter was perched, but the person said they did not think to notify anyone to get President Trump
00:08:21.100off the stage. Another troubling finding from the bipartisan Senate investigation was how technical
00:08:27.600issues downed those Secret Service drones during the July 13th rally. Turns out the agent
00:08:34.060responsible for overseeing the counter-unmanned aircraft systems, CUSA, called a toll-free
00:08:41.500888 tech support hotline to start troubleshooting with the company. In other words, they didn't know
00:08:47.720how the technology operated. There was no backup plan. It took several hours to get the drones
00:08:53.600back up and running, and the agent responsible for the drone operations only had about three
00:08:58.700months' experience with the equipment. The U.S. Secret Service denied specific on-the-ground
00:09:04.200requests for additional drone capabilities and a counter-assault team liaison in Butler that day.
00:09:11.660Investigators also found that there was no clear chain of command among the Secret Service and the
00:09:17.540other security agencies, including the state and local police, and no plan for coverage of the
00:09:23.520building where the shooter climbed up to fire the shots. Officials were operating on multiple
00:09:29.840separate radio channels, as I said, leading to miscommunications, and an inexperienced drone
00:09:35.920operator was struck on a helpline after his equipment wasn't working correctly. Communications
00:09:42.240among security officials were a multi-step game of telephone, according to one of the investigators.
00:09:49.220The trove of files released today include FBI interviews with Thomas Matthew Crook's father, Matthew, who revealed he never really had a father-son bond with his son, the alleged gunman, and that his stoic son really expressed strong emotions, hardly laughed, and was very difficult to read.
00:10:11.580Thomas also started getting into shooting and guns as a teenager, although he had little interest in the outdoorsman's life.
00:10:19.140The father said he briefly took interest in hunting, but said he couldn't envision him actually killing an animal.
00:10:24.760He also said that his son, Thomas, hated fishing.
00:10:28.960Matthew said his conversation with his son, Thomas, during this period,
00:10:32.900was usually brief and gun-related, such as the then-team wondering if he could do a,
00:10:38.680have to do a background check to buy his dad's Glock, a question he told investigators that he found odd.
00:10:46.400The father also asked the son if he could have his grandfather's guns.
00:10:50.800Thomas Matthew Crooks, the alleged shooter, started going to a gun club around the time of the pandemic and was a terrible shot.
00:10:58.180He couldn't hit the paper target, the father told investigators, estimating it took four to five years of practice before he would be able to do that.
00:11:07.600Eventually, with practice, Thomas became a better marksman, according to the dad,
00:11:11.600coming home with range targets showing off to his father how well he did with the target placed over
00:11:16.920100 yards away. After he questioned his son about why he was going out so far, the young man
00:11:25.200explained he wanted to see how far he could shoot with rudimentary sights. He found he was able to
00:11:31.040shoot even further distance after he bought a prism sight, eventually becoming, quote, very
00:11:36.400knowledgeable, according to the Senate report, about how to measure and zero in on a target
00:11:41.100and knew exactly how many clicks it would take to change the specific angle on the site.
00:11:47.180As Thomas Matthew Crook's interest in guns grew, according to the Senate report, he started buying
00:11:52.600large numbers of Amazon packages, including parts, tools, and items to increase the capacity
00:11:59.320of his rifle. He also took to using that pseudonym, Bob Dole. I was a staff assistant
00:12:06.240to Senator Bob Dole from 1973 to 1974. So I find this is some kind of a cruel joke using the name
00:12:15.940of a great American patriot, perhaps one of the greatest Americans of the 20th century, as your
00:12:21.300pseudonym. But it was a part of a misguided paranoia that he picked up from his father's
00:12:27.760citizen's bank checking account, was hacked, and after that he began using the pseudonym.
00:12:33.640The father said the son believed if he were to purchase items under a pseudonym, such as the former presidential candidate's moniker, the buyer could never actually be trapped.
00:27:07.400If the building were open, innocent people would have been killed.
00:27:10.760A security guard had just passed the area one minute prior to this ceiling collapse.
00:27:16.820He was, therefore, 60 seconds away from certain death.
00:27:21.000The judge has made us keep it open, even though there are no performances and no people would have to have the courage to even go into the building.
00:27:28.660The board of the Kennedy Center has strongly voted to save it, and they know I'm the only one who can do so because I have the ability to raise the money from private sources and the ability to construct that few others have.
00:27:41.060I also have the strength and power of the presidency, which will be needed to do what
00:27:45.920must be done and give it a strong shot at greatness again. Remember, the president wrote,
00:27:51.380the Kennedy Center was losing hundreds of millions of dollars when I took office. It was failing
00:27:56.220badly. It had nothing to do with me. I'm only there to help. I just got there to reveal the
00:28:02.060facts, but especially those concerning building safety. A very hostile and conflicted judge,
00:28:08.420What else is new, the president wrote.
00:28:10.400Seems like he won't let that happen, in which case, unfortunately, the building is destined to doom.
00:28:16.560Isn't that too bad, the president says characteristically.
00:28:19.760We've already wasted more than six months playing around in court.
00:29:19.860Property crimes have fallen sharply, as have assaults.
00:29:23.040The people in Washington, D.C. actually feel safe again. Their city is cleaner again. Their history is honored again. And frankly, it's all thanks to the vision and courage of President Donald Trump, who faced nothing but harsh backlash and lawsuits for his efforts to restore order in the nation's capital.
00:29:41.880Meanwhile, a federal judge on Tuesday referred the George Soros-backed Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner for federal criminal investigation to determine whether he should be charged with conspiracy or obstruction of justice in his efforts to overturn a murder conviction.
00:29:59.960U.S. District Judge Paul Diamond, a George W. Bush appointee, actually a friend of mine, an old friend of Senator Arlen Specter, said testimony from the district attorney's staffers described conduct by Larry Krasner and his top deputy, Matthew Stiegler, as troubling.
00:30:19.520Larry Krasner, the district attorney, and his attorneys are now being accused of committing crimes such as subverting perjury
00:30:25.880after they received a court petition to overturn a 2009 second-degree murder conviction.
00:30:33.600Dennis Johnson was convicted of second-degree murder in 2009 for the slaying of Kenyatta Smith at a Philadelphia convenience store.
00:30:43.380Johnson was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
00:30:46.140Over the last 10 years, Johnson has been fighting his conviction, insisting that he is innocent.
00:30:53.320Four prosecutors in the District Attorney's Office alleged that Krasner pressured staffers to provide false information to the court to shield a supervisor for blame in this matter.
00:31:04.180Quote, I have thus reluctantly concluded that Philadelphia's highest law enforcement official and one of his top assistants may have violated the law, Judge Diamond wrote.
00:31:13.420In these circumstances, with the issuance of this memorandum, I refer the Department of Justice, Mr. Krasner, the District Attorney's Office, and Mr. Stigler to the U.S. Attorney's Office for investigation and other appropriate action, Judge Diamond wrote.
00:31:31.880Krasner and Stigler are both barred from any further participation in Johnson's ongoing bid to overturn his murder conviction.
00:31:41.440Meanwhile, the University of Utah threatens to expel a college Republican after they exposed evil leftists celebrating Charlie Kirk's assassination.
00:31:51.580It was on September 10th, a wicked leftist named Sarah Larson sparked a national uproar after going to a college Republican event, holding a cake and celebrating Charlie Kirk's assassination.
00:32:47.320At the time of the incident, the University of Utah College Republicans were promoting a memorial for my friend Charlie Kirk to be held at the university.
00:32:55.460Now, Larson later offered a phony apology for her actions, which the college Republicans accepted.
00:33:01.160Now, the leftist schools are repaying this overtly generous gesture by trying to ruin the lives of Barnes and other Republicans.
00:33:09.980University of Utah's College Democrats have gone to the dean of students to demand that Larson and another college Republican be expelled for daring to expose Larson's sick gesture, celebrating the assassination of my friend Charlie Kerr.
00:33:25.840Barnes and her Republican friend announced yesterday that the University of Utah claims Barnes and her friend engaged in threatening or endangering behavior by merely exposing the picture online.
00:33:39.860She now has an expulsion hearing reportedly scheduled for 8.30 Pacific time today.
00:33:45.280The threats against Barnes and her friends have drawn the attention of Harmeet Dillon, the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Justice.
00:33:54.680Utah, what's going on over there, she wrote on X.
00:34:00.060Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Monday rejected the Trump administration's emergency bid to enforce new U.S. Postal Service restrictions on mail-in ballots ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, leaving a lower court's nationwide block in place.
00:34:17.080This is a substantial blow to election integrity in the 2026 effort.
00:34:23.000In a brief order, the court said the government was unlikely to succeed on the merits for purposes of obtaining emergency relief
00:34:29.720and had not shown that the legal and practical considerations warranted a stay.
00:34:34.800The rules would require federal ballot mail to be sent in envelopes bearing an election mail logo
00:34:41.000capable of being skinned by high-speed equipment and carrying a barcode unique to each voter.
00:34:47.900President Donald Trump addressed this ruling in a post to his Truth Social post yesterday, writing,
00:34:53.440Republicans just got another bad decision from the U.S. Supreme Court, one that the court system took forever to give,
00:35:00.020and then blamed it in part on no time being left to implement a solution to our totally corrupt and out of control mail-in voting disaster,
00:35:09.640which the president says is a laughingstock all over the world
00:35:14.040and where we're the only country who has to endure such national disgrace.
00:35:20.160The president praised Justices Alito and Thomas,
00:35:24.860calling them both legends for strongly dissenting with the terribly political ruling.
00:35:30.840This is a big loss for Republicans and I think for the country itself
00:35:34.000and it makes cheating by Democrats or anyone else who would corrupt our elections far easier.
00:35:40.840I remember when Bill Barr was the U.S. Attorney General, and he was in an interview with Wolf
00:35:49.780Blitzer at CNN, and he specifically said that mail-in ballots were an open invitation for voter
00:35:57.200fraud. What happened to that Bill Barr? That is the same Bill Barr who, as Attorney General,
00:36:02.800said that he had seen no evidence of election fraud in 2020, and who shut down an active
00:36:09.180investigation in Pennsylvania, both in the city of Philadelphia and in Delaware County,
00:36:15.680where there was hard evidence of voter fraud. Thanks for joining me today in the Stone Zone.
00:36:22.460I'm Roger Stone, where five days a week we talk news, history, politics, food, and style. Until
00:36:29.700tomorrow. God bless you and Godspeed. Thanks for listening to The Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
00:36:37.600You can hear The Stone Zone with Roger Stone weeknights at 8 on 77 WABC. If you like the
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