Authorities have charged 21-year-old Robert E Crimo with seven counts of first-degree murder following a mass shooting that killed at least seven people and injured 36 during a July 4th parade in Illinois.
Mr. Crimo was taken into custody after a short chase near Lake Forest, a city north of Chicago, about six miles from the scene of the massacre, several hours after shots were fired from a high-powered rifle into a crowd enjoying the holiday.
The gunman appeared to have taken up a sniper position on a rooftop before opening fire and causing scenes of chaos as people ran for cover for their lives.
On Tuesday, the police said Mr. Crimo had purchased the weapon legally in the Chicago area.
Chris Covelli of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office revealed that the suspect had “planned his attack for several weeks” and was dressed in women’s clothing to hide his identity at the time of the shooting.
He reached the roof via a fire escape and used a high-powered rifle similar to an AR-15 to fire more than 70 rounds into the crowd.
Photo of Robert Crimo dressed as a woman to escape the area of the mass shooting
(WGN9)
After the shooting, he managed to climb down the fire escape and blend into the crowd before walking to his mother’s home, who lived nearby, and taking her car.
“This person was originally reported to have long hair, so a wig is not out of the question.”
A member of the public identified Mr. Crimo’s vehicle from information released by authorities and called 911, and he was arrested a short time later after police located the car.
A search of his home also found numerous other firearms, including handguns.
A motive for the attack is not yet known, but police said they do not believe it was racially motivated.
Five people died on the spot. A sixth died later in hospital on Monday and a seventh person was confirmed dead on Tuesday.
Who is Robert Crimo?
Mr. Crimo goes by the nickname Bobby and is an amateur rapper. He is said to have uploaded several videos online many months before the shooting, filled with violent images and images of mass murder.
He goes by the stage name ‘Awake the Rapper’ and has more than 16,000 listeners per month on his Spotify page.
His social media footprint shows him to be a video game enthusiast who seems to fantasize about mass shootings.
A recent video purportedly posted by Mr Crimo on YouTube appears to show the aftermath of a school shooting, with him covering himself with an American flag.
In another animated video titled “Toy Soldier”, he appears to show his own death.
The video shows a man who appears to be Mr. Crimo wearing a black T-shirt with his YouTube channel logo and lying in a pool of blood during a confrontation with police.
The video begins by showing a student texting in class as Mr Crimo raps “fuck this world” with visuals showing a heavily armed gunman opening fire on a school.
This still image taken from a video shows a drawing of a man lying in blood
(Robert Crimo via REUTERS)
In another video, in which he appears in a classroom wearing a black bicycle helmet, he says he is “like a sleepwalker. I know what I have to do,” adding that “everything has led up to this. Nothing can stop me, not even myself.”
The YouTube channel that posted the videos was taken down Monday night after being available to the public for months.
In 2020, he was photographed attending a Donald Trump rally dressed as the main character from Where’s Waldo? In another photo on Twitter, he is seen wrapped in a Trump flag as a cape. He was also photographed wearing an FBI hat and had liked a Joe Biden video.
Mr. Crimo had his own Discord server named “SS” where he chatted with people. It has since been taken down. According to NBC News, the community included a political board with several nihilistic memes.
The last community post before the shooting was in March, showing a photo of Bud Dwyer, the Pennsylvania state treasurer who shot himself on live television in the late 1980s, with the caption, “I wish politicians still gave speeches like this.”
Robert Crimmo is the middle child of three siblings and his IMBD page describes him as a rapper, singer, songwriter, actor, and director from Chicago
(Robert Crimo via REUTERS)
Discord users shared pictures of Mr. Crimo with one selfie that appeared to mention suicide. His caption read: “Screenshot the cursed image and send it to everyone or commit to not being alive anymore (sic).”
On Tuesday, Spotify and Youtube removed all of Mr. Crimo’s content, according to CNN.
“Following the horrific incident in Highland Park, our trust and safety teams identified and quickly removed offending content in accordance with our Community Guidelines,” YouTube said in a statement.
“Spotify, in partnership with the distributor, has removed the content in question,” Spotify said in a statement.
According to the FBI, Mr. Crimo has tattoos on his face showing four telltale marks with a line running through them on his right cheek and cursive above his left eyebrow that reads “Wake Up.”
Mr Crimo also has tattoos of red roses and green leaves on his neck.
Suspect threatens to ‘kill everyone’
Highland Park shooting suspect Robert Crimo
(Robert Crimo/Reuters)
Mr Crimo threatened to “kill everyone” in his home with a “collection of knives” three years before he started shooting.
Police said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon that officers were called to his home for incidents twice in 2019.
The second time – in September 2019 – police were called to a report by a family member that Mr Crimo had vowed to “kill” the people in the home and that he had a “collection of knives”, including a sword.
Officers responded to the scene and confiscated the knives, but did not arrest the suspect.
It came after police were first called to the home in April 2019 on reports that Mr Crimo had tried to kill himself.
Despite the incidents, Mr Crimo was able to legally purchase a number of firearms in the run-up to Monday’s attack.
A strange obsession with the number 47
The 21-year-old seems to have an obsession with the number 47.
Police believe Robert “Bobby” Crimo III was dressed in a wig and women’s clothing before using a high-powered rifle to fire more than 70 shots into a crowd in suburban Chicago on Monday morning, killing six and injuring dozens.
Mr. Crimo’s extensive digital footprint frequently mentions the number 47.
He also had a number tattooed on the side of his face and it was also painted on the door of a car parked outside his family home.
The family of Robert Crimo
Mr. Crimo’s father has been identified as Bob Crimo Sr., 58, a local deli owner who once ran for mayor of Highland Park in 2019 but lost by a two-to-one margin to the incumbent.
Just days after the Uvalde Elementary School shooting in Texas, in which 19 children and two teachers were killed in a mass shooting, a Twitter account believed to belong to Mr. Crimo Sr liked a tweet in support of the Second Amendment.
“Defend the Second Amendment like your life depends on it,” read the May 28 tweet.
His mother has been identified as Denise Pessina, 48, a Mormon who offers alternative therapies, the Daily Mail reported.
Crimo is seen at school in a screenshot from a social media video
(Robert Crimo via REUTERS)
Mr. Crimo’s IMDb page describes him as the middle child of three siblings in an Italian-American family in Highland Park, Illinois.
His uncle, Paul Crimmo, told Fox 23 Chicago that the family saw “no warning signs” that he might have been involved in the shooting.
“I didn’t see any signs of trouble. And if I saw signs, I would have said something,” his uncle said. He said his nephew was a “YouTube rapper” who once worked at Panera Bread.
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