Southern Florida District U.S. District Judge Ryan Routh, who is accused of trying to kill former President Donald Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course, will go on trial before Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee who oversaw the Biden DOJ’s phony secret papers case.
A would-be assassin was confronted by a Secret Service advance squad on September 15 after they noticed a rifle barrel protruding through a fence around the course. The guy ran about 300 yards from where the former president was when an agent opened fire.
An eyewitness saw the suspect leaving the scene and was able to describe the suspect’s personal characteristics and the gunman’s car to law authorities. Soon after, the suspect—later identified as Ryan Routh, 58—was apprehended in neighboring Martin County without any problems.
A federal indictment against Routh was delivered on Tuesday by a Miami grand jury, which included three additional counts in addition to the two federal firearms charges Routh was already facing. The alleged shooter is accused of assaulting a federal officer and having a firearm in the course of committing a violent crime in addition to trying to kill a presidential candidate.
The maximum punishment for the attempted assassination charge is life in prison.
“The attempted assassination on the former president is a heinous act,” U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a press conference Tuesday. “I am grateful that he is safe, and as I said immediately after the event, the Justice Department will spare no resource to ensure accountability.”
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who recently dismissed the Biden DOJ’s investigation against former President Donald Trump involving sensitive materials, will preside over the case against Routh. Attorney General Garland’s nomination of special prosecutor Jack Smith, according to Cannon, went against established constitutional practice.
“The relevant history, according to Special Counsel Smith, shows that Congress tacitly authorized—or silently acquiesced to—the use of Section 515 (or its predecessor statutes) to appoint “special attorneys” like himself… Upon review of the murky historical record, the Court determines that, whatever themes can be drawn from that background, they cannot supplant the plain language of the statute itself, which clearly does not vest the Attorney General with such authority,” she wrote.
Cannon, whose courtroom is located in Fort Pierce, Florida, was assigned the case through a random draw among about 10 federal judges who regularly take cases arising in the Palm Beach area, according to a report from Politico.
Routh was held in pre-trial detention on Monday after it was revealed that he had written about his desire to assassinate Trump and was offering a $150,000 bounty to anyone who could pull it off.
