A dispute over public access to a recorded statement that the former roommate of Tyler James Robinson, the 23-year-old accused of murdering Charlie Kirk, gave investigators took center stage on the third day of a hearing to determine whether there is probable cause for the case to move to trial.
The statement from Lance Twiggs, whom authorities say was also Robinson’s romantic partner, has been the source of public intrigue. Robinson allegedly left a handwritten note for Twiggs where he wrote he had an “opportunity to take out” the conservative commentator and was “going to take it”.
State district judge Tony Graf ultimately ruled that a redacted portion of the recording could be played in court on Thursday. The redaction, which amounts to a trim of roughly 16 minutes from Twiggs’s statement, deals largely with text messages Robinson sent, according to Graf.
“I recognize the importance of transparency. I also recognize the importance of balancing constitutional rights and it is a fine line,” Graf said.
Kirk was fatally shot on 10 September while speaking before thousands of people convened for a Turning Point USA debate on the campus of Utah Valley University.
On Wednesday, prosecutors asked Graf to permit a recording of Twiggs’s statement to be played for the court.
Richard Novak, a defense attorney, objected to the request, saying that there were remarks Twiggs attributed to Robinson that the prosecution has characterized as “confessions”.
In Novak’s view, the comments, if they were to be televised, could taint the jury pool and violate Robinson’s right to a fair trial.
The state also clashed with defense lawyers over redactions the latter proposed for a transcript of Twiggs’s remarks. Utah county deputy prosecutor Lauren Hunt said the proposal was not timely and that it was “disrupting the hearing”.
Novak countered, saying he “went to great lengths to provide the state … with a proposed redacted transcript”.
An attorney for Kirk’s family also weighed in on the contentious statement.
“The Kirk family believes strongly that if the evidence is being admitted in this preliminary hearing, it should be made public for the world to see. No redactions,” said Jeffrey Neiman before the court. “To not be transparent here, to not be open, to not let the world see what happened will create doubt and distrust in the judicial system.”
Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, and his parents have attended the legal proceedings.
The state also displayed a video without audio during Wednesday’s hearing that they said showed Robinson after turning himself into law enforcement officers.
Robinson, who has not yet entered a plea in the case, has been charged with aggravated murder. If he is convicted of the charge, the state is seeking the death penalty.
The preliminary hearing is expected to conclude at the end of the week.
So far, prosecutors have presented DNA evidence they said ties Tyler Robinson to the killing of Charlie Kirk.
Jennifer Faumuina, a prosecution witness and Utah investigator, told the court on Tuesday that FBI testing found Robinson’s DNA and that of his roommate on a screwdriver recovered from the rooftop where authorities believed the perpetrator fired from.
Their DNA, investigators said, was also found on a towel that was wrapped around a rifle that officials say was used in the killing.
Robinson’s roommate has not been accused of playing any role in the killing of the far-right commentator last September.
Defense attorneys for Robinson challenged the reliability of the DNA testing.
On Tuesday, Michael Burt, one of Robinson’s defense attorneys, asked Amanda Bakker, an FBI forensic analyst, about a 2004 report that found “a number of errors” with the way testing was performed at the Quantico, Virginia, laboratory where the DNA analysis took place. The prosecution objected to the move.
The hearing has also included testimony from law enforcement officials describing the shooting, its immediate aftermath and the early stages of the investigation.
This week, prosecutors showed video footage that they say depicts Robinson entering the campus of Utah Valley University on the day of Kirk’s killing and climbing on to a roof, from where they say he fired a fatal shot.
The state also submitted graphic footage of the shooting into evidence that was not shown to the public.
Meanwhile, Robinson’s defense on Tuesday challenged the idea that he was hostile to Kirk’s politics, and attempted to block prosecutors from introducing a statement describing the traditional Christian values of Turning Point USA.
“This doesn’t say anything about Mr Robinson’s state of mind,” Novak said about the statement. “I don’t think that this court should be deciding – based on the record before it – where, if at all, politics and religion intersect.”
Prosecutors have previously cited a statement by Robinson’s mother that her son had recently “become more political and had started to lean more to the left, becoming more pro-gay and trans rights-oriented”.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed reporting
