Thomas Matthew Crooks botched Rifle Club exercise, clearly practiced since

Thomas Matthew Crooks clearly practiced seriously at a shooting range before attempting to kill Donald Trump — because now we know how bad his shooting was in high school, and why he didn’t make his rifle team.

TMZ has spoken to sources directly familiar with Crooks’ attempt to make the Bethel Park High School team, and we’re told he had a disastrous performance at the shooting range… sometime between 2018 and 2019, which resulted in him not in the team.

Our sources – who knew Crooks personally – tell us that not only was he a bad shot… he was a total mess with a firearm, which was proven when he accidentally fired into a completely different trajectory than his own.

We’re told Crooks was in a practice session – which served as a tryout – and while trying to shoot at a target about 30 yards away, he ended up hitting someone else’s target to his left.

Our sources, who saw him missed so much, tell us that this is the reason why he was not given a place in the team.

It’s also why another former classmate says he was surprised Crooks came as close to attacking Trump as he did. sucked so bad years ago.

What you can take from this is that the man has clearly improved in the years since this botched exercise, as he came within an inch of taking out the former prez.

Another source, also aware of Crooks’ failed tryout, tells us that he was nearly unable to hit any of the ten targets on a 10×12 paper – and at one point he accidentally got a discharge downwards, or lost sight of which target was his and saw someone else’s.

There’s also this… we’re told that the other members of the rifle team would make fun of Crooks behind his back for his lack of skills, but no one ever saw him downright bullied …as some reports claim.

Surprisingly, our sources all said he showed no aggression whatsoever and was just a socially awkward child.

As we reported… that was the 20-year-old shooter murdered by the secret service last weekend… but not before he did made some shots of an assault rifle…one of which hit Trump’s ear, killing another audience member Corey Comperatore.