What we know and don’t know

The roommate of the suspect in the murder of Charlie Kirk had one question.

“Why?”

“I had enough of his hatred,” Tyler Robinson wrote. “Some Oms cannot be agreed.”

On Tuesday, authorities released messages between Robinson and the roommate of the hours after the shooting. Officials said the unnamed roommate was a “biological man” who was passing from man to woman and was in a romantic relationship with the defendant.

Prosecutors also gave additional details that could indicate a possible motive – although there are still many, which is not known.

According to an indictment, Robinson’s mother told police that in the last year or more, Robinson had become more political and left, “more darling and transferees are oriented.”

And in family conversations before shooting, Robinson allegedly accused Kirk of distribution of hatred.

Prosecutors say Robinson left a message about his roommate: “I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and take it.”

During the press conference on Tuesday, Utah Prosecutor Jeff Gray said, instead of deleting the messages, as Robinson asked, the roommate provided police missions.

Messages and interviews with family members form decisive parts of the accusation against Robinson and give some idea of ​​his state of mind.

In addition, investigators also said four shells have been found along with a rifle found in a wooded area near the University of Utah University.

The shell loans were engraved in them, which before Robinson’s arrest were among the only potential clues regarding the killer’s motive – and were the subject of much speculation.

A casual circle had the words “Hey fascist! Catch!” Together with Up, Right and Three Down Arrow – the most likely reference to a video game, Helldivers 2 showing one of the special moves of the game.

Another shell body, the authorities say, read “The OBO Mountains What is it?” – Reference to MEM for fluffy subculture and online role -playing games.

The BBC has also seen an online profile claimed to be owned by Robinson on a website dedicated to Furry Fandom, suggesting that he may have been interested in the topic.

Another corps was written with lyrics from the song Bela Tsao, who honors the guerrillas of two era of World War II of the Italian resistance, which is fighting Nazi Germany. The song also appeared in a video game, a television series and has been covered and remixed many times over the years since.

The fourth cartridge reads: “If you read this, you are gay lmao” – another online reference.

But the exact meaning of the messages, if they are indeed intended to have any meaning beyond a joke, it is not yet clear. The nature of online language, with its layers on irony of layers, means that multiple interpretations are possible.

In the messages to his roommate, Robinson said the engravings were “mostly a big meme”, which may show that they should not be taken as a serious statement.

Photos of social media accounts, apparently owned by Robinson and his roommate, which are distributed online, are most focused on the game – it seems that both Robinson and his roommate are passionate video gamers.

The accounts include several scattered comments about politics, none of them particularly categorical or directly indicative of a motive. The BBC has reviewed accounts but has failed to confirm that they belong to the couple.

According to reports published by prosecutors, when asked by his roommate how long he took to plan the attack, Robinson replied, “Just over a week.”

The prosecutors at Utah most declined to answer questions from the media on Tuesday, and although state governor Spencer Cox said Robinson had “left -wing ideology”, there are still gaps in what we know about a possible motive.

For example, it is not clear what a particular Robinson found undoubtedly for Kirk. It is also unclear how radicalized Robinson may be and what role his online activities in this process may be.

Authorities were tight with what role – if there was one – the policy of the suspect game in the attack.

When Gray, the District Attorney, was asked directly if transsexual activism had inspired the shooting, he declined to comment.

It remains the possibility that the suspect did not have a coherent political position. In several recent US mass shootings and attempts to kill – including the attempt to kill Donald Trump in Pennsylvania last July – the murderers seemed to have had a shuffled set of political beliefs or an ideology is not clearly defined.

Recently, the FBI has recognized a new category of threat called nihilistic violent extremism or NVE, defined by a common hostility to society and a desire for chaos, not by a sharply defined ideology.

FBI Director Kash Patel said at a hearing in the Senate on Tuesday that his agency had seen a large leg in the cases associated with NVE.

In the case of Kirk Catherine Schweit, a former FBI agent and prosecutor, said investigators would be busy tracking Robinson’s online communications and interactions with friends and family members to get more information.

“This gives us a lot of idea of ​​someone’s path to violence,” she said, adding that agents would “put them together to see how someone moves on the way from powerlessness to fully choose to perform a violent act.”

The prospect of the death penalty means that prosecutors will have to show the intention to commit murder when they insist on their case in court. However, Schweit says this is different from the motivation that may or may not be directly related to the case.

“Television and films have taught us that the motive is the most important, but from the perspective of the prosecution is not the case.”

Schwait also noted that some high -profile killers were motivated by the desire to be known or impress people.

During the Senate hearing on Tuesday, FBI Director Patel also said that others were investigating a possible participation in the shooting.

So far, no one else has been charged with the case and investigators have not indicated that someone else has been involved.

This has not stopped the trained – and in their bigger part are not related – speculation online for supposed motives and large -scale plots.

A number of right -wingers with huge consequences on social media, including several that are close to the organization of President Trump and Kirk Turning Point USA, claim that the shooting was the work of a group or a “terrorist cell” inspired by transgender activism and left -winged.

Trump said this week he will define Antifa as a “great terrorist organization” as part of his efforts to focus on the “radical left” after Kirk’s murder. The suspected Robinson was not directly related to Antipha, decentralized, left -wing movement that opposed the extreme, racist and fascist groups.

Some high -profile right podcasts, including former Trump Chief Advisor Steve Bannon, have suggested text messages exchanged by Robinson and his roommate, were somehow false or false, suggesting – again without evidence – a broader conspiracy.

At the same time, a number of left-wing social media users continue to claim that Robinson is a supporter of Trump or a member of fringe, a far-right group known as “Groypers”-which consistently cast Kirk for not supporting their white nationalist and anti-Semitic beliefs.

These allegations also have no evidence, and Utah prosecutors and employees did not indicate that they were involved in the right -wing groups.

“Everyone jumps to conclusions because this is the society we live in,” says Schweit, the former FBI agent. “Everyone wants an answer – and now.”