Police were able to establish that Robinson “had been on campus approximately four times throughout the day, twice before the shooting, the time of the shooting, and after the shooting, later in the evening into the early hours of the 11th.”
Monday morning saw the start of the preliminary hearing of Tyler Robinson, the man charged with killing Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University (UVU) in September 2025. The hearing had originally been set to take place in May but was delayed, and is currently scheduled to take place for the whole week in Provo, Utah. The preliminary hearing is where the prosecution will attempt to establish probable cause to try Robinson for the killing. If convicted, Robinson will face the death penalty.
Officer Chris Bagley
First to testify was Officer Chris Bagley, who currently serves as a Spanish Fork Police Department officer and served as a UVU officer on the day of the shooting. During questions from Chad Grunander for the prosecution, Bagley was shown a number of images depicting the campus, its buildings, and the surrounding area. The defense objected to the admission of the exhibits, arguing that "a foundation hasn’t been laid" as to who took the photo and when, with Graf overruling the objections.
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During questioning from the prosecution, Bagley recounted his experience being on the scene on September 10, 2025, the day Kirk was killed. He said he was securing the Hall of Flags walkway, which was located above the tent in which Kirk was located when he was hosting his event on campus.
He said he came in to do a shift for the special event on campus, and observed Kirk arrive on campus and do a meet-and-greet with some people, before entering his tent below. He said there were "several thousand" people in attendance, both in the grass amphitheater area and up on buildings and walkways.
Recounting the moment the shooting occurred, Bagley said, "I heard an individual talking to Charlie, and I happened to kind of glance over the edge of the railing, about that time I could see the right side of Charlie’s shoulder." The rest of Kirk’s body was obscured by the tent. "He was answering a question, a kid asking him a question, and then I heard a shot fired." He recalled that the time this took place was 12:23 pm local time.
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He said he saw Kirk "lean to the left," going further under the tent. "Then everybody started getting up and starting to run in more of a chaos kind of situation." He said that he recognized the noise as gunfire, left his post, and began fighting against the crowd flowing against him "so I can help stop an. individual that’s probably shooting." By the time he got to the bottom of the stairs, someone said over the radio that "we had a shooter in custody."
As Bagley recounted the events of the shooting, Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, left the room. Also in the courtroom on Monday was Donald Trump Jr. and his wife who sat in the front row along with Human Events' senior editor and Human Events Daily host Jack Posobiec. Charlie Kirk’s parents and sister were also in attendance.
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After hearing that a person was in custody, Bagley said he began assessing whether anyone else was injured. After observing no other injuries, he began working on preserving the crime scene by getting people out of the grass area of the courtyard. "As we started pushing those guys out, my chief, Chief Long, that was next to me, I looked down and saw an empty pistol holder that was sitting just on top of the grass. At that moment, things had died down just a split second. I realized that the shot I heard was more of a rifle shot and not a pistol shot." He said from his training as a police officer, he was able to recognize the gunshot as coming from a rifle. The person who was in custody was later identified and released after being deemed to be not a suspect.
Regarding the holster, Bagley said he turned to his chief and said "that was a rifle shot." The chief, Bagley said, agreed. "And I looked up at that moment, right in the line of sight, I could see the Losee building had a direct line of sight. So I proceeded to go look at that and see what was going on up there." Bagley said he heard the shot come from his east.
On top of the Losee Center, Bagley said he discovered a red and black screwdriver. Bagley was also shown a photograph from the top of the Losee Center, from which he said you could, among other things, see the grass courtyard area and the tent where Kirk had been speaking. He described images shown in the courtroom of gravel that was disrupted on the roof of the Losee Center. At the very top of the Losee Center, Bagley said he could observe what "looks like a sniper pad, a person that has been laid in a prone position," with the markings of elbows, knees, and feet in the gravel "in the line of sight of where Charlie’s tent was."
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After his findings on the rooftop, Bagley said he asked dispatch to look at the camera system to see if anyone was on the roof at the time of the shooting. Dispatch said that there had been a man on the roof and described that "he ran to the edge, dropped down, crawled, got in a prone position" toward the direction of the tent. He then went to the police department in a nearby building to look at the footage himself.
"At that moment, I realized I had more, more crimes, a bigger crime scene that I needed to contain and preserve for that moment. I went and grabbed some more crime scene tape, and I responded to the northeast side of the building." Outside the building, he saw "impressions of the shoe print inside the grass, and also up above on that northeast side of the building, I could see on the cement where someone had scuffed there, and then dropped down to the shoe imprint," he said.
Kathy Nester questioned Bagley on behalf of the defense, asking about security briefings and the holster he found. Bagley said he had not received a security briefing on the event that day prior to starting his shift, and that when he arrived for his shift, he immediately went to the Hall of Flags area to assist officers in stopping people from throwing items down on the tent.
She also questioned him about a report he prepared in the wake of the shooting. "We gotta ask this now, did you use AI to help you prepare your report," she asked, with Bagley saying he did not. She pressed him about his testimony that he recalled hearing the shot from his East, asking if he had mentioned that in his report. Bagley said he had not.
Regarding the holster, Nester asked what happened to the holster. Bagley said he did not know, and that no one had taken custody of it.
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Investigator David Hull
David Hull, a current Utah Department of Public Safety Peace Officer Standards and Training investigator who was working as a State Bureau of Investigation’s Major Crimes Division investigator at the time of the shooting, was the second person to testify on Monday.
He said he was directed to go down to Utah valley University following the shooting that took place. "We often respond with the crime lab to help process crime scenes, but it would be normal for us to be called out to assist another agency," he said. Hull said he was a lead investigator for SBI at the scene.
He said the SBI’s priority was "determining whether we had an ability or a way to be able to identify who had been involved in the shooting," and this involved collecting data as it became available. Among the data gathered from the general public through tips and social media were videos taken at the scene.
Multiple videos collected by the team were played in the courtroom, including clips of Kirk at the beginning of the event, a video showing the moment that Kirk was shot, as well as Kirk in the moments after he was shot.
Hull said he learned from a medical examiner who was at the scene that Kirk was pronounced dead. He said the Utah Medical Examiner’s office conducted an autopsy late in the evening of September 10, with Dr. Guajardo conducting it. He stated that the cause of death listed in the autopsy report was a murder, and the manner of death was a gunshot wound to the neck. After an objection from the defense saying that the cause of death was homicide, not murder, the comment was corrected.
Hull said that on the night of September 11, "we received word from Washington County that an individual in the area had reached out to law enforcement and was wanting to turn themselves in for the incident at UVU." He said the name they were given from Washington County was Tyler Robinson.
After receiving the name, the State Information and Analysis Group put together a "workup" of information that included driver’s license records and other records to determine addresses, photos, associated vehicles, and other information. Hull said Robinson’s driver’s license was pulled, which included identifying information, and a DMV record returned a vehicle associated with Robinson, a silver Dodge Challenger. Robinson's mother had co-signed for Robinson on the car.
After receiving that information, he said they were able to use video to try to track where he went, and that they were able to establish that Robinson "had been on campus approximately four times throughout the day, twice before the shooting, the time of the shooting, and after the shooting, later in the evening into the early hours of the 11th."
Hull was asked, given that he had viewed "numerous hours of video from UVU," if he were to be able to recognize if Robinson was in the courtroom that day. He said he was in the courtroom, but when he was asked to point him out, the defense objected. Judge Graf said that for the purposes of the preliminary hearing, Hull was allowed to identify Robinson.
The prosecution also attempted to show a compilation of video showing Robinson’s movements around campus on the day of the shooting, however, the defense objected after Hull said that some changes had been made to the footage. Graf said the exhibit could not be shown because of the alterations and that there were not corresponding statements substantiating the alterations. The prosecution later said they would return on Tuesday morning with unaltered versions of the videos.
Hull also recounted footage that was gathered from nearby neighborhoods, including Ring doorbell footage provided showing a vehicle consistent with the one identified as belonging to Robinson parking across the street in the early hours of September 11.
The preliminary hearing in the Tyler Robinson case will resume at 9 am local time on Tuesday with continued testimony from Hull.