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Prosecutors Release Footage of Cole Allen Raising Shotgun at Secret Service

Prosecutors Release Footage of Cole Allen Raising Shotgun at Secret Service
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Newly released surveillance footage from the Washington Hilton appeared to show the suspect in last month’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting raising a shotgun toward a Secret Service officer before gunfire erupted, strengthening prosecutors’ claims that he fired first in an attempted assassination of President Donald Trump nbcnews +1. The edited five‑minute compilation, made public May 1 by federal prosecutors, came ahead of a preliminary hearing set for May 11 for the suspect, 31‑year‑old Cole Tomas Allen of Torrance, California cbsnews +1.

The April 25 attack unfolded as Allen allegedly sprinted through a hotel corridor toward the ballroom security checkpoint, armed with a 12‑gauge shotgun, a .38‑caliber pistol and knives, while Trump and senior officials attended the dinner below abcnews +1. Allen has been charged federally with attempted assassination, transporting firearms across state lines with intent to commit a felony, and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence cbsnews.

What the New Video Shows — and What It Doesn’t

The high‑resolution footage, compiled from multiple cameras, showed Allen “casing” the hotel the day before the dinner, then returning on April 25 and running roughly 60 feet through a hallway toward magnetometers outside the ballroom nbcnews +1. At the checkpoint, he appeared to raise a shotgun toward a Secret Service officer; synchronized with separate ballroom audio, at least six shots were heard in about 1.4 seconds, a pattern analysts said is consistent with one shotgun blast and five rounds from the officer’s handgun nbcnews +1.

Visible muzzle flashes in the video all came from the officer’s weapon, with four flashes clearly captured before he moved off‑camera; no obvious muzzle flash from Allen’s shotgun was seen on the released angles, leaving some of the sequence to audio and forensic interpretation nbcnews. Prosecutors said investigators recovered a spent shell in Allen’s shotgun and at least one fragment “physically consistent” with a buckshot pellet, evidence they argued supports the conclusion that Allen fired and struck the officer, not friendly fire cbsnews. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro asserted there was “no evidence the shooting was the result of friendly fire” when she posted the clip on social media cbsnews.

Legal and Political Fallout for a High‑Profile Case

The video release immediately fed into courtroom and political tensions around the case. While the images and recovered buckshot fragment bolstered the government’s narrative that Allen opened fire on federal agents while attempting to reach Trump, defense attorneys have questioned whether the footage and ballistics definitively prove he pulled the trigger, noting the missing muzzle flash and technical limits of buckshot analysis nbcnews +1. Audio experts quoted by major outlets also cautioned that sound alone cannot assign each of the six shots to a specific gun without further forensic corroboration nbcnews.

Inside the courtroom, a federal magistrate judge privately admonished prosecutors at a May 1 detention hearing, saying she did not want proceedings to “turn into a circus” after government lawyers appeared eager to showcase evidence as the edited video was being pushed out publicly pbs. The episode is likely to fuel defense arguments about prejudicial pretrial publicity and could prompt motions over discovery, including demands for raw, unedited footage and underlying forensic reports. Still, even if disputes persist about which round hit the wounded officer, the core counts — particularly attempted assassination — do not require jurors to find that a specific projectile struck any one person cbsnews +1.

The Bigger Picture

The new footage gave the clearest view yet of how an armed assailant penetrated multiple security layers at a marquee political-media event, even as Secret Service officials insisted the “site was set up perfectly” and that their response prevented mass casualties bbc. As investigators finalize ballistics work and prosecutors prepare for grand jury action, the case now hinges not only on what the grainy hallway cameras captured in a span of seconds, but also on how aggressively each side can frame that evidence — for a potential jury and for a public already saturated with competing narratives.

nbcnews New York Times, May 2, 2026
cbsnews NBC News, May 1, 2026
yahoo NPR, Apr. 27, 2026
abcnews Reuters, Apr. 26, 2026
nytimes PBS NewsHour, May 1, 2026
cbsnews NBC News / court filings, May 1, 2026
nbcnews Washington Post & CNN audio/video analyses, Apr. 29–May 1, 2026
cbsnews DOJ officials and court filings, late April–May 1, 2026
pbs CNN reporting on detention hearing transcript, May 1, 2026
bbc PBS interview with Secret Service Director, May 1, 2026