Tyler Robinson's former roommate and romantic partner told investigators that Robinson confessed three times to killing conservative activist Charlie Kirk, first in a handwritten letter, then in a series of text messages, and finally in person when he returned to their shared apartment the day after the shooting. The pre-recorded video deposition of Lance Twiggs was played Thursday in a Provo, Utah, courtroom during Robinson's preliminary hearing on charges that could carry the death penalty.
Robinson, 23, is accused of fatally shooting Kirk in the neck on September 10, 2025, at a Turning Point USA event at Utah Valley University in Orem, in front of thousands of people. He has not entered a plea.
The deposition footage, recorded earlier and shown to the court at the 4th District Court in Provo, laid out what prosecutors say is a damning chain of admissions. Twiggs, 22, who was granted limited immunity by both the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Utah County Attorney's Office, described each alleged confession in sequence, starting with a pre-scheduled text message that arrived on his phone shortly after Kirk was shot.
The first confession, Twiggs testified, came through a letter Robinson left under his keyboard at their shared apartment in St. George, Utah, roughly three hours from Utah Valley University. Robinson allegedly sent Twiggs a pre-scheduled text directing him to find it: "drop what you are doing, look under my keyboard."
Twiggs found a handwritten note. Prosecutors presented it as an exhibit. The letter, addressed to Twiggs by the name "Luna," contained the line: "I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and I'm going to take it."
That letter was accidentally broadcast on a court livestream during the July 9 evidentiary hearing, briefly violating a judge's order prohibiting its public display. The Washington Examiner reported that former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani downplayed the legal impact, noting, "None of this is being shown to a jury. We don't even have a jury yet."
The second confession came through text messages, also presented in court. After receiving the letter, Twiggs texted Robinson: "what????????????" followed by "you're joking right????" Robinson's response, according to the exhibit: "F*** I TRIED TO DELETE THAT."
But he did not stop there. Robinson allegedly continued: "shouldn't be long until I can come home, but I gotta grab my rifle still. to be honest I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve you."
Twiggs pressed him directly: "you werent the one who did it right????"
Robinson's reply: "I am, I'm sorry."
The third confession, Twiggs told investigators, happened face to face. Robinson returned to the St. George apartment on September 11, the day after the killing. Twiggs said he woke to find Robinson walking around the apartment.
Utah County prosecutor Ryan McBride asked Twiggs in the deposition: "Did he talk about what he had done?"
"Didn't go into detail... I just asked him in person if what he said was true the night before, and he said it was... started crying a little bit, and said he wishes he hadn't done it."
Twiggs added that Robinson eventually said "he would talk to his parents or turn himself over."
Brian Davis, an investigator with the Utah State Bureau of Investigation, testified that Twiggs' deposition matched an early police interview conducted on September 12, 2025, two days after the killing. That consistency matters. It means the account Twiggs gave under oath in the courtroom was the same story he told investigators when the events were still fresh, before any immunity deal was in place.
The hearing also featured evidence from other angles. Prosecutors showed video footage earlier in the week that allegedly traced Robinson's exact movements at Utah Valley University on the day of the shooting. AP News reported that an edited, enhanced surveillance video depicted a figure running across a rooftop and crawling toward the edge, consistent with the alleged shooting position, and that the footage prompted a visible emotional reaction from Kirk's widow and mother.
Prosecutors say Robinson used a bolt-action Mauser rifle, a.30-06 caliber weapon described as his grandfather's old hunting rifle. In one text message presented in court, Robinson allegedly mused that the weapon "does just fine."
Twiggs testified that approximately one month before Kirk's death, Robinson asked whether they had a Dremel tool. The reason Robinson gave at the time: he wanted to engrave messages on bullets for a hunting trip with family.
"I don't remember exactly when, but he had said he was planning to go hunting with his family and he asked me... if we had like a Dremel, because he said he wanted to [engrave messages on bullets]."
National Review reported that the messages engraved on the bullets included "Hey fascist, catch" and a reference to an anti-fascist resistance song. The same outlet reported Robinson wrote in text messages to Twiggs: "I had enough of his hatred. Some hate can't be negotiated out."
FBI DNA analysis, also presented by prosecutors, allegedly links Robinson to DNA found on a towel used to hide the rifle. Separately, DNA likely matching both Robinson and Twiggs was found on a screwdriver recovered at the location where Robinson allegedly positioned himself for the fatal shot. Robinson allegedly ditched the rifle near the scene as he fled.
Prosecutors say Robinson had been planning the killing for over a week before September 10.
One of the more striking details from the deposition was what Twiggs said Robinson did not talk about. Twiggs testified that Robinson "rarely spoke about LGBTQ+ issues and was more interested in Trump and his policies." He added a line that cuts against easy assumptions about motive.
"I personally had never heard him talk about Charlie Kirk before specifically."
That testimony leaves the question of Robinson's specific motive unresolved. Prosecutors have not publicly articulated a clear motive. The text messages referencing Kirk's "hatred" and the engraved bullet messages suggest ideological hostility, but the full picture remains incomplete. No explicit motive was stated in court during the deposition.
Twiggs, who showed up to his deposition in a coat and tie, and was told to spit out his gum before it began, was shown personal texts, Discord messages, and the handwritten note during his recorded interview with investigators. Discord messages from a private server were also presented as exhibits, though their specific contents were not quoted in open court.
Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk's widow, broke down in tears during the hearing. She pleaded with the judge for the full public release of Twiggs' interview with prosecutors, arguing the release would help end conspiracy theories that have circulated since Kirk's death.
Jeffrey Neiman, the Kirk family's attorney, made the case directly to the judge:
"The Kirk family has waited 10 months for this hearing... They have a right to see and feel what's going on in this courtroom."
He added: "To be here and not to see the evidence, what's the point of being here?"
Robinson's defense team, whose members were not identified, pushed to keep media from broadcasting the video and text messages outside the courtroom, arguing it would violate Robinson's rights and prejudice the jury pool. The judge's ruling on that motion was not detailed in the hearing coverage.
The preliminary hearing, which began earlier in the week, is designed to determine whether probable cause exists to send the case to trial. Former prosecutor and trial attorney Wendy Patrick told Just The News that the defense appeared to be "testing the waters to see how much of what type of evidence the judge is going to admit, because that's going to inform their trial strategy."
Robinson faces the death penalty if convicted. The hearing was expected to conclude Friday, though AP News reported it was adjourned until September. The Supreme Court is separately weighing cases on death penalty procedures that could affect how capital cases like this one proceed.
What stands out about the prosecution's case so far is how much of it rests on Tyler Robinson's own statements. The letter. The texts. The in-person admission. The engraved bullets. The crude jokes prosecutors say he made in messages after the killing. At every turn, Robinson appears to have documented his own guilt, and then confessed it again and again to the one person closest to him.
Twiggs' testimony, corroborated by investigators who interviewed him two days after the shooting, paints a picture of a young man who committed an act of political violence, drove three hours home, cried about it, and told his roommate he wished he hadn't done it. That is not a profile that fits neatly into any narrative. It is the profile of someone who allegedly planned a killing, carried it out in front of thousands, and then unraveled almost immediately.
Charlie Kirk was a husband, a father, and the founder of one of the largest conservative youth organizations in the country. He was shot in the neck at his own event. His widow sat in a courtroom ten months later, in tears, asking a judge to let the public see the evidence. That request should not have been controversial.
The facts presented in that Provo courtroom don't need embellishment. They speak clearly enough on their own, and they demand a verdict that matches their weight.