A witness described the shocking moment Charlie Kirk was fatally gunned down on Wednesday as “pretty scary stuff.”
Footage from the outdoor event at the Utah Valley University (UVU) campus in Orem shows Kirk sitting in a tent-like booth, holding a microphone and addressing the crowd, when a shot suddenly rings out. The bullet hits Kirk in the neck and blood could be seen gushing from his wound. He was subsequently pronounced dead at the age of 31.
“It’s a bummer because whoever did this was able to enter the premises with a firearm,” eyewitness Justin Hicken told The Independent in a phone interview a short time later.
“It’s just a sad thing. I’m very conservative myself, I’m pro-second amendment,” Hicken said. “But at the end of the day, you’ve got to make sure you’re taking good, secure measures when you’re hosting events like this. Because all it takes is one lunatic.”
Hicken showed up to the event a few minutes before it started, and estimated the size of the crowd at 3,000 to 4,000 people “packed into a little outdoor amphitheater.”
“Unfortunately, there were no metal detectors or anything,” Hicken said.
At first, Hicken was standing so far back that he couldn’t even see Kirk. But, he went on, “I was able to finagle my way down along the side and wound up probably about 20 yards away from him, to his far left.”
Following an exchange between Kirk and an attendee about religion, another person stood up and asked a question about mass shootings, according to Hicken.
“He got about 60 to 90 seconds into it, and that’s when the shot went off,” Hicken explained. “I saw blood spurting from Charlie, his body kind of recoiled, everybody started screaming.
“People dropped to the floor, a whole bunch of bodies all over, just crazy stuff. As I was on the floor with bodies on top of me, I was listening, praying, that hopefully there are no more shots.”
When the sound of a second shot failed to materialize, everyone sprang up and fled, Hicken added. He was brought inside one of the university buildings by officials, who took his info, and said he emerged a short time later to “literally hundreds of emergency vehicles” and a Swat team fanning out on the grounds.
Following the shooting, Hicken posted a video to X of an older man being detained by police on the scene. Initial news reports described the man as a suspect; a UVU spokesperson subsequently said he was not.
The campus will be closed until further notice.
