The man accused of hiding out with a gun near Donald Trump’s West Palm Beach golf course in an apparent bid to kill the former US president, wrote a chilling letter offering a bounty on Trump’s life months before the alleged assassination attempt.
US prosecutors say Ryan Routh, 58, penned the letter, which read: “This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump but I failed you,” as well as offering $US150,000 ($A220,000) to “whomever can complete the job”.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Gunman’s chilling letter ahead of alleged Trump assassination attempt.
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Prosecutors say several months before the incident on September 15, Routh dropped off the handwritten letter addressed to “the world” at the home of an unidentified civilian witness along with a box including ammunition, a metal pipe and four phones.
On Monday, US local time, Routh fronted court and was ordered to remain in jail without bond pending trial on the two gun charges currently brought against him.
US prosecutor Mark Dispoto said the Justice Department would ask a grand jury to bring the more serious attempted assassination charge against Routh, which could carry a life sentence if convicted.
On Tuesday, former White House spokesperson Peter Seat appeared on Sunrise, and lashed the prosecutors’ decision to release the letter.
“To me, not only is it chilling, but I also think it was irresponsible on the part of the prosecution to release this letter because in it the gentleman says that someone needs to finish the job,” Seat said.
“He believed he was going to fail, and he offered $150,000, which obviously isn’t going to happen, for someone to ‘finish the job’.
“I think it is irresponsible because it invites a copycat (attempt on Trump’s life), and I think they should have either redacted that portion (of the letter) or just withheld this for the time being.”
Seat said the letter dashed any chance of an “insanity defence” for Routh.
“(It is) certainly premeditated, and he is not going to be able to employ the insanity defence, which we already knew because he ran away from the scene of the attempted assassination,” Seat said.
“So he is going to get hit on this hard. He is going to go to jail for a very, very long time, likely the rest of his life.”
Authorities have not yet divulged a motive for the incident, which the FBI has said was being investigated as an apparent attempted assassination of Trump ahead of the November 5 presidential election.
It came about two months after another gunman wounded Trump on the ear during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
— With AAP