On Charlie Kirks Courtroom Tapes of The Killing Few Can Watch

There are only 14 seats for the public in the tiny courtroom in Provo, Utah, where the hearing is taking place.Credit...Jim Urquhart/Reuters

On Day 1 of what is expected to be a weeklong hearing, prosecutors played videos of the shooting for a judge, but they were graphic and kept from public view. Erika Kirk and Donald Trump Jr. were in court.

 

By Jack HealyNicholas Bogel-Burroughs and Robert Draper

Jack Healy and Robert Draper reported from Provo, Utah. 

Graphic videos, detailed police accounts and high-profile conservative figures defined the first day of a hearing to determine whether prosecutors have enough evidence to take a 23-year-old man to trial for the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

The preliminary hearing in Provo, Utah, is like a reduced trial, with testimony and exhibits presented to a judge. The hearing resumes on Tuesday and is expected to run through the end of the week. After that, the judge, Tony Graf, will decide whether prosecutors have met their burden to try the defendant, Tyler Robinson, on a charge of aggravated murder that could bring the death penalty.

 

The Utah County prosecutors who are trying the case played several videos that were taken on Sept. 10 at Utah Valley University in Orem, where Mr. Kirk was shot while speaking to a large crowd.

Many videos of the shooting were widely shared on social media within hours of Mr. Kirk’s killing, but others appear to have never been shown publicly. And several that prosecutors entered into evidence on Monday were shown only to the parties and the judge — not the public — because of their graphic nature. 

During one, Judge Graf noticeably flinched, apparently in response to the gunshot that fatally struck Mr. Kirk in the neck, while watching his monitor. When it had concluded, he returned to his normally staid approach.

“And that concludes state’s Exhibit 8,” he said.

David Hull, an officer who was one of the lead investigators on the Kirk shooting, testified that the police had reviewed hundreds of hours of videos, including campus surveillance footage and many taken by the thousands of people who attended Mr. Kirk’s event.

Defense lawyers questioned whether the person seen was Robinson

Mr. Robinson’s defense strategy is still largely a mystery, because he has not yet entered a plea.

But his lawyers offered a glimpse of how they might try to defend their client in the face of digital evidence and witness statements. They questioned the authenticity of videos, brought up gaps in the security at the college where Mr. Kirk was killed, and raised questions about how Mr. Robinson was identified as a suspect. 

A woman in a dark suit trundles a rolling bag through a parking lot.

Kathryn Nester, the lead defense lawyer, lodged numerous objections to the prosecution’s evidence.Credit...Marielle Scott/Associated Press

“Nothing that you found that day,” Kathryn Nester, the lead defense lawyer, asked one police witness, “was able to identify who the shooter was?” 

Their line of questioning could propel conspiracy theories that have swirled around the case for months, many involving the possibility of alternate shooters.

Ms. Nester also zeroed in on a pistol holster that a campus police officer, Chris Bagley, testified he had seen lying on the grass moments after Mr. Kirk was killed. He said it was not far from where Mr. Kirk had been speaking, and that he did not know what ultimately happened to it. Officer Bagley said, however, that the gunshot he had heard moments earlier sounded like it was from a rifle, not a pistol.

The defense team has been able to slow the case with delays and procedural objections, a strategy they continued on Monday. They objected to allowing several pieces of evidence to be admitted or published in court, including overhead photos of the Utah Valley University campus, witness videos and Mr. Kirk’s autopsy results.

Among those in court was President Trump’s son

President Trump’s oldest child, Donald Trump Jr., made an unexpected appearance in the courtroom on Monday, along with Mr. Kirk’s parents and his widow, Erika.

The president’s son and his wife, Bettina Anderson, sat in the front row. The conservative commentator Jack Posobiec was also at the hearing as a guest of Mr. Kirk’s family. 

Erika Kirk and other relatives left the court at sensitive points of the hearing. Judge Graf paused at one point to note that, unlike the general public, people associated with the victim are allowed to exit and enter the courtroom whenever they need to.

Before the proceedings began on Monday, a statement from Ms. Kirk, as well as Mr. Kirk’s parents and his sister, said that “every court proceeding serves as a painful reminder of his death.”