Utah prosecutors fighting to keep the death penalty on the table against accused Charlie Kirk assassin Tyler Robinson argue his shoddy target practice proves he knowingly risked killing bystanders in a crowd of thousands.
In a reply brief made public Tuesday, prosecutors pushed back hard against Robinson's defense team, which had moved to strip a key death-penalty aggravating factor from the case before trial. The aggravator requires the state to prove the September 2025 shooting at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, created a great risk of death to someone other than Kirk, and that Robinson knew it. Prosecutors told the court that Robinson "seldom hit the bullseye and sometimes missed the target completely" when practicing with the suspected murder weapon, a fact they say proves he understood the danger his shot posed to the crowd below.
Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, was taking questions from the audience on a small stage in the campus courtyard when a single round struck him in the neck. He died from the wound. Robinson allegedly fired from a rooftop above the event, which drew thousands of attendees as part of Kirk's "American Comeback Tour."
Robinson allegedly drove from his home in southern Utah to the Orem campus to carry out the attack. After the shooting, he confessed to several people before turning himself in to authorities in his hometown. He has not yet entered a plea.
Among those he allegedly told was his roommate and romantic partner, Lance Twiggs. Twiggs testified during a week-long preliminary hearing in early July that Robinson confessed in person, in a letter, and through a Discord message. Twiggs told the court he asked Robinson directly whether his earlier admission was true.
"I just asked him in person if what he said the night before was true, and he said it was."
Robinson also confessed in writing, leaving a letter that read, "I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I took it." In a text message sent after the shooting, Robinson wrote: "I had enough of his hatred. Some hate can't be negotiated out."
Prosecutors also presented forensic evidence during the preliminary hearing, including Robinson's DNA on the murder weapon, video placing him on the UVU campus, and bullet casings engraved with mocking phrases, one of which read, "hey fascist! CATCH!" The engraved casings were found alongside the alleged murder weapon.
The state's theory of motive centers on ideology. Utah County prosecutors argued in an earlier filing that Robinson targeted Kirk because of Kirk's conservative religious and political views on gender and sexuality, which conflicted with Robinson's own lifestyle and his relationship with Twiggs.
"This evidence supports a strong and eminently reasonable inference that Defendant targeted Mr. Kirk because of Defendant's belief or perception regarding [Mr. Kirk's] political expression."
Prosecutors called the case against Robinson overwhelming, writing that the decision to send it to trial was "likely as straight-forward a bindover decision as this Court will ever see." They added bluntly: "This isn't a close case."
The preliminary hearing in Provo drew intense public attention. Cameras were permitted inside the Fourth District Courthouse, and the Kirk family attended to face the man accused of killing their loved one.
Robinson's defense team has taken a narrower approach. In its earlier filing, the defense argued the fatal gunshot came from above the crowd and did not travel through it. Only one shot was fired, it struck the intended victim, and no bystanders were hit. On that basis, the defense moved to have the death-penalty aggravating factor stricken before trial, effectively removing the possibility of a death sentence if Robinson is convicted.
Prosecutors rejected that reasoning in their Tuesday reply. They argued that Robinson's own practice record, rarely hitting his target, proves he could not have been confident the round would strike only Kirk. Firing into a venue packed with thousands of people, they contend, created exactly the kind of risk the aggravating factor was designed to address.
The prosecution went further, accusing Robinson's defense attorneys of having "violated their ethical duty of candor to the Court" by ignoring basic case law governing how evidence should be weighed at the preliminary hearing stage. Prosecutors insisted the magistrate "must" draw all reasonable inferences in the state's favor when deciding whether probable cause exists to send the case to trial.
The accusation of ethical misconduct is a sharp escalation in the pretrial maneuvering. It signals prosecutors view the defense motion not merely as a losing argument but as one that misrepresented the legal standard to the judge.
Judge Tony Graf Jr. said he would issue a final decision on September 1 on whether enough probable cause exists to send the case to trial. Robinson's defense had until August 18 to file a counter-brief. Robinson faces multiple charges that carry the death penalty.
Charlie Kirk was 31 when he was killed. He had built Turning Point USA into one of the largest conservative youth organizations in the country, with chapters on hundreds of college campuses. His willingness to engage hostile audiences, taking open questions from crowds, debating critics face-to-face, made him a prominent target of left-wing protest. That openness also put him on a small stage in a campus courtyard in Orem on the night he was shot.
Kirk's death intensified concern about rising threats against public figures, particularly those on the political right. The shooting also exposed the gap between the rhetoric that treats conservative speech as dangerous and the actual danger faced by the people delivering it.
In the months since Kirk's death, some activists have mocked his killing publicly, a fact that has only hardened the resolve of Kirk's supporters and his family to see the case through to a full trial, and, if the evidence holds, a sentence that matches the crime.
The prosecution's marksmanship argument may prove decisive on the death-penalty question. If the judge agrees that Robinson's poor aim made every person in that crowd a potential casualty, the aggravating factor survives, and Robinson faces the full weight of Utah's capital punishment statute at trial.
A man who could barely hit a target chose to fire into a crowd of thousands anyway. The prosecution's case is that he knew the risk and pulled the trigger regardless. September 1 will tell us whether a judge agrees that risk deserves the law's ultimate answer.