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A pair of gray Converse sneakers with white shoelaces helped authorities nail Tyler Robinson for Charlie Kirk’s assassination, newly surfaced court documents reveal.
Utah Valley University surveillance video captured Robinson, 22, sporting the kicks as he bizarrely moved around the campus in the moments leading up to the Sept. 10, 2025, fatal shooting from a campus building rooftop, according to a search-warrant affidavit unsealed Thursday.
Investigators later found a shoe impression from the rooftop that was “consistent with the shoe sole characteristics of a Converse/Chuck Taylor shoe” that Robinson was wearing at the time, the affidavit stated.
A separate court document noted that police later recovered a pair of “grey Converse shoes with white laces” from Robinson’s St. George family home while executing a search warrant.
The accused capital-murderer was captured on video footage 33 minutes before the fatal gunfire, when he was seen walking through a grassy area on campus, then through a parking lot and pedestrian tunnel.
Robinson – who was also wearing a blue hat, sunglasses, dark jeans, a black backpack and a long-sleeved black shirt depicting an American flag and eagle – at first walked with a limp, Utah authorities noted in the court docs.
“Robinson appears to walk with a stiff right leg and at a relatively slow pace,” the affidavit stated, noting that his “ability to bend his right leg appears to be restricted.”
At one point before entering the tunnel, Robinson then whips out a cell phone and types something before putting it into his back pocket.
He continues into a parking garage, where “a bulge” in his clothing – presumably the firearm used to shoot and kill the 31-year-old political activist – is visible for the first time, according to the papers.
“As Robinson approaches the landing on the stairs between the first and second floor [of the parking garage], it appears as though there is something bulging out from Robinson’s waistband area as he walks up the stairs,” the documents said.
“The bulge appears to be underneath Robinson’s black shirt and on the right side of Robinson’s waistband area,” the affidavit said.
Footage then shows Robinson entering UVU campus’s Losee Center, walking up a flight of stairs and climbing over a wall to get onto the building’s rooftop, where he lays low for about 5 minutes before allegedly taking his shot.
During that time, he “lays down in a prone position near the edge of the rooftop and appears to be facing west, in the direction of the courtyard area…where the event featuring Charlie Kirk was taking place,” the court papers stated.
Seconds before Kirk is shot, Robinson suddenly pops up and begins springing in a way that’s “in stark contrast to the slow and restricted gait observed by Robinson in earlier surveillance camera footage,” authorities noted in the docs.
Now at another corner of the rooftop, “Robinson places a dark colored item on the rooftop and proceeds to lower himself” and allegedly fires at the father of two, who was debating a student on a stage about 200 yards away.
Seconds later, “Robinson drops off the rooftop onto the grass below” and takes off running, according to the documents, which say investigators recovered the bolt action rifle, wrapped in a towel, in the grassy area Robinson ran through.
Investigators also found “fingerprints and a smeared palm print in the vicinity of the northeast corner rooftop edge of the Losee Center building where Robinson dropped off the rooftop to the ground below,” the docs state.
The alleged gunman was turned in by his father after a 33-hour-long police manhunt.
He now faces the death penalty if convicted of aggravated murder and is being held behind bars.
Robinson is due back in court April 17, when his lawyers are expected to argue why the press shouldn’t be allowed to record or take photos at his hearings and trial.
English (US)