A judge in Utah on Tuesday ruled that a trial for the 23-year-old man accused of fatally shooting prominent conservative political activist Charlie Kirk can move forward.
District Judge Tony Graf issued the decision after a day of arguments in a probable cause hearing. Prosecutors argued there was enough evidence against Tyler Robinson to proceed with the case, while defense attorneys maintained that the evidence was insufficient.
“It is hereby ordered that the defendant, Tyler James Robinson, is bound over for trial,” Graf said.
Robinson’s defense attorney then entered pleas of not guilty on all counts on his behalf. The next court date was set for Oct. 23.
Prosecutors have charged Robinson with aggravated murder, a first-degree felony that makes him eligible for the death penalty, and other counts.
Robinson is accused of killing Kirk with a single rifle round fired from a rooftop at an event at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10. The assassination of Kirk, the 31-year-old co-founder of the youth advocacy group Turning Point USA and a close ally of President Donald Trump, rocked U.S. politics.
In the lead-up to his ruling, Graf allowed lawyers on both sides to present closing arguments Tuesday. Evidence was presented in July.
“It’s not difficult to understand the motive here,” Utah County prosecutor Ryan McBride told the court during the state’s closing arguments. “The defendant’s views were repugnant to the positions that Charlie Kirk famously took.”
McBride alleged that Robinson threatened the lives of the people who attended Kirk’s event last September.
“You can’t shoot a rifle into a crowd of 3,000 people without knowing that you create a great risk of death to all those around your target,” McBride said in part.
Robinson’s defense attorney, Richard Novak, said the state can’t prove what would have motivated the shooting.
“There’s no evidence as to really what was in Mr. Robinson’s mind, if in fact he was the shooter, about Charlie Kirk,” Novak said.
“Because we have no testimony that Mr. Robinson had ever spoken about Charlie Kirk, that he’d ever heard anything he’d said, that he’d ever discussed anything” about Kirk in the past, Novak said.
Another defense attorney, Staci Visser, argued that Utah’s legal aggravator that Robinson’s act posed a great risk of death to others does not apply because multiple shots or threats were not made.
“There is one act, there is one shot, there is one bullet, there is one victim,” she said.
Graf in his ruling allowed the aggravator and said the state met its burden at this preliminary stage, but he did not rule on the merits.
Tuesday’s high-stakes hearing came nearly two months after prosecutors laid out a detailed public reconstruction of the alleged events surrounding Kirk’s killing and presented a trove of evidence against Robinson, including security video, digital records and forensic material.
David Hull, a former State Bureau of Investigation agent, characterized Robinson’s alleged movements before and after the assassination. Hull’s testimony at a five-day hearing was accompanied by excerpts from campus video shown in court for the first time.
Robinson arrived at the university hours before the shooting, bought a meal from a campus Chick-fil-A restaurant and made contact with representatives for Turning Point USA, Hull testified. Robinson then changed outfits and took a position on a rooftop overlooking the amphitheater where Kirk was speaking, Hull said.
In a video shown in court July 7, Robinson could be seen crouching on the rooftop, Hull told the court. Then, after a bullet hit Kirk, Robinson could be seen darting across the roof, dropping to ground level and sprinting away on foot, Hull added.
Prosecutors played another video featuring partially redacted excerpts from law enforcement investigators’ interview with Lance Twiggs, Robinson’s former romantic partner and roommate.
The day after Kirk’s assassination, Twiggs told investigators, Robinson nervously paced their apartment and expressed regret. Twiggs told investigators that he asked Robinson whether it was true that he fatally shot Kirk.
In the emotional interaction that followed, according to Twiggs, Robinson “said he wishes he hadn’t done it.”
Twiggs told investigators that Robinson said he intended to confess to his parents or go to the police. He turned himself in to law enforcement authorities later that day.
Investigators have said they found the suspected murder weapon — a bolt-action rifle — wrapped in a towel in a wooded area near the Utah Valley University amphitheater. DNA from both Robinson and Twiggs was on the towel, Sgt. Jennifer Faumuina of the Utah Department of Public Safety testified July 7.
Robinson’s lawyers tried to throw doubt on the DNA evidence and pressed a defense witness, FBI forensic analyst Amanda Bakker, about the potential for error in forensic testing and other issues.
Robinson’s defense lawyers have not provided an alternative theory for who killed Kirk.
In a charging document filed last September, prosecutors highlighted inscriptions alleged to have been etched on each round of the rifle, including the phrases “Hey Fascist! Catch!” and “If you Read This, You are GAY.”
Twiggs, in the recorded interview played in court, told investigators that Robinson never talked about Kirk before the shooting. The roommates-turned-partners had originally bonded over their shared love of video games, Twiggs said.
Kirk family attorney Jeffrey Neiman on Tuesday asked that the court act swiftly and to “set this trial as soon as practically possible.”
“The United States Constitution guarantees criminal defendants many rights. The right to delay is not among them,” Neiman said.
