CNN follows the path of 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, the young man who attempted to kill Republican President Donald Trump, revealing what the would-be assassin did 48 hours before he pulled the trigger.

On Friday, he went to a Pittsburgh shooting club he was a member of and practiced his mark, authorities said. It is the Clairton Sportsmen’s Club, which is a 25-minute drive from the perpetrator’s home. There, according to authorities, he went with his father and they liked to practice shooting together. The club has more than 2,000 members and the shooting range, where he practiced on the mark, the attacker has a distance greater than what existed between him and Trump, when he tried to kill him.

Rob Bootay, the club’s lawyer, told CNN that “the Club fully condemns the senseless act of violence that took place”.

The next morning, Matthew Crooks did his essential shopping at Home Depot, where he bought a ladder, and at Allegheny Arms and Gun Works, a gun shop in Bethel Park, where he got 50 rounds of ammunition.

He then took his Hyundai Sonata and drove an hour north, about Trump’s speech in Pennsylvania, where hundreds of citizens from across the state had gathered to watch him. He parked outside where the speech was to take place and had an improvised explosive device hidden in the trunk. On it was found the attached transmitter that would activate the explosion.

This suggests the gunman may have planned to detonate a blast from a distance, and investigators are considering the theory that he had in mind a distraction during the shooting.

He used the ladder to climb a nearby building and from there shot former US President Donald Trump.

What was the perpetrator’s motive?

Investigations are ongoing with authorities still looking for a motive behind the attempted murder and facing a lack of evidence to piece together his mindset. The data from his mobile phone and the search on his computer and his search history, dthey do not indicate political or ideological intent. The same is confirmed by interviews with family and friends.

Instead, the evidence they found appears to show typical online activities, including his interest in computers and games, the sources said, and that raises more questions. Also, investigators analyzing his online search history have found no indication that he looked up how to make improvised explosives.

What did the perpetrator’s parents say?

Matthew Crooks did not respond to requests for comment from CNN on Sunday and Monday. On Saturday night, before officials publicly confirmed his son’s role in the attack, he told CNN he was trying to figure out “what the hell is happening” but he added “I’ll wait until I talk to the authorities before I talk about his son.”

The shooter’s parents, who are cooperating with authorities, told investigators that Crooks did not appear to have any friends and had no political leanings. But they didn’t seem to know much about what was going on in their son’s life recently, authorities sources said.