Robert ‘Bobby’ Crimo social media: The gunman’s family said there were no signs of violence, but a regard of his social media profiles and artistic pursuits showed nihilist and violent predilections.
How does a young suburban adult who maintains a low profile, exhibits no public signs of violence and living in an affluent community become a mass shooter?
The uncle of Highland Park shooting suspect Robert ‘Bobby’ Crimo said he was a normal kid who showed no signs of violence despite being a loner who lived in an apartment behind his parents’ house who was out of work after losing his job at Panera when the pandemic hit.
Crimo, 22, was arrested on Monday at 6.30pm after an eight-hour manhunt. The man’s arrest followed the unassuming suburban Chicago man living in the affluent area of Highwood fatally gunning down 6 and injuring another 25 during a 4th of July parade earlier that morning.
He is now in custody awaiting his first court appearance but he has not yet been charged. His family spoke to the FBI yesterday before he was finally tracked down in Lake Forest, eight miles north of the parade route where he is accused of opening fire at 10.15am.
Paul Crimo, the alleged gunman’s uncle, in media interviews has since told of his nephew behaving normally in the hours leading up to Monday’s blood-bath.
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JUST IN — Part of a disturbing 2021 music video featuring the person of interest in the Highland Park parade mass shooting, Robert Crimo. He went by the moniker “Awake, the rapper.”
— Insider Paper (@TheInsiderPaper) July 4, 2022
‘We’re all good people here…’
The uncle claims Crimo showed ‘no signs of violence’ – despite YouTube rap videos in which he glamorized school shootings. To date the shooter’s motive for Monday’s mass shooting (yet another…) remained unknown.
‘I’m heartbroken. I’m so heartbroken. There were no signs that I saw that would make him do this. He’s a quiet kid. He’s usually on his own. He’s a lonely, quiet person. He keeps everything to himself,’ Paul Crimo told CNN.
‘Everything was as normal,’ he said. ‘We are good people here, and to have this is devastating. I’m so heartbroken for all the families who lost their lives.’
Crimo’s parents have not yet addressed the attack. Needless to say, the question begged how did those closest to Crimo fail to see the obvious warning signs that their son was on the precipice of self destruction and harbored violent anti social tendencies?
His father Bob Sr. ran unsuccessfully for mayor against Nancy Rottering. On Tuesday morning, Rottering appeared on TODAY to confirm that Crimo ‘legally obtained’ his weapon. She said she taught him when he was a cub scout, and that he was a normal ‘little boy’. Police are yet to confirm what type of weapon he used, but witnesses and videos suggest it was a high-powered rifle.
‘It’s one of those situations where you stand back and ask, what happened? How did somebody become this angry, this hateful, to then take it out on innocent people who were just literally having a family day out.?
‘He was just a little boy,’ she said.
Life following art?
Despite his low public profile, Crimo nevertheless exhibited anti social tendencies, covering his body with tattoos, including a flower tattoo covering his entire neck, as well as on the side of his temple and the word ‘Awake’ above one of his eyebrows. Crimo also appears to have hatch marks that add up to five under his eye. Self decoration or a young man dissolving into antipathy, disillusion along with a kind of rebellion?
Hinting at the rebellion and nihilism the suburban 20 year old felt, Crimo as an amateur rapper released a number of ‘troubling’ songs that alluded to violence, mass shootings and distrust of society.
Going by the moniker, Awake the Rapper, Crimo had than 16,000 listeners per month on Spotify before the platform de-platforming him.
Music videos posted by Crimo online last fall include a drawing of himself shooting people online, as well as video clip of himself throwing bullets on the floor of a classroom while wearing armor, referencing school shootings.
Crimo also had a Discord server where he would chat with friends and fans, and his most recent post was a picture of Budd Dwyer, the Pennsylvania state treasurer who killed himself on live TV in the 1980s, which he captioned: ‘I wish politicians still gave speeches like this.’
He also made references to suicide and frequently posted on a message board discussing graphic depictions of murder and death, including a recent video he shared of a beheading.
Jacki Sundheim and Nicolas Toledo were among the six people killed. More than 30 others were injured https://t.co/CalCmD0CDv
— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) July 5, 2022
And the victims keep piling in yet another mass shooting
Among those killed was synagogue teacher Jacki Sundheim, a married mother, and grandfather Nicolas Toledo, 78. Four others have not yet been named.
Another 25 people aged between eight and 85 suffered gunshot wounds. Six people remain in hospital.
The US has now seen 309 mass shootings so far this year in which four or more people, excluding the shooter, were shot or killed. Eleven alone took place over the holiday weekend.
Welcome to a brave new disillusioned America …
