Featured Image Credit: FBI
Topics: Charlie Kirk, Utah, Crime, US News
Niamh Shackleton
Bullet casings found in connection to Charlie Kirk's death had messages written on them.
Last week, the world was rocked by the news that 31-year-old rightwing activist Kirk had been killed.
Kirk was attending an event at Utah Valley University when he was fatally shot in the neck by someone in the crowd.
Tyler Robinson, 22, has since been named as a suspect in the case and is currently being held without bail.
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His arrest came after the FBI released photos and video footage of a man thought to be linked to Kirk's death in the hopes of getting the public's help in identifying the individual.
22-year-old Robinson is the main suspect in the investigation into Kirk's assassination. The Utah native was named by police on September 12.
Reportedly Robinson has 'leftist ideology', says Utah Governor Spencer Cox, despite growing up in a 'conservative family'. Robinson was possibly radicalised on the dark web.
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"Clearly there was a lot of gaming going on," Cox told NBC.
"Friends have confirmed that there was kind of that deep, dark internet, the Reddit culture, and these other dark places of the internet where this person was going deep."
Bullet casings allegedly used by Robinson were found by law enforcement to have engravings on them.
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A day after the incident, investigators revealed they that had found a bolt action rifle wrapped in a dark colored towel, as well as bullet casings that had messages written on them, including, 'hey fascist' and 'catch'.
One unfired casing read 'oh Bella caio, bella ciao, bella ciao ciao ciao', and another said: 'if you read this you are gay lmao'.
Another said 'Notices bulge OwO what’s this?'.
The unusual messaging on the casings will have left many people scratching their heads, but those who are chronically online will know that this particular writing refers to a meme from the 2010s.
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In 2015, the meme that pokes fun at the furry community and roleplay culture went viral.
FurScience says of a 'furry': "The term furry describes a diverse community of fans, artists, writers, gamers, and role players.
"Most furries create for themselves an anthropomorphized animal character (fursona) with whom they identify and can function as an avatar within the community."
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Some people have a sexual interest in these anthropomorphic animal characters.
In the meme in question, two men are sat at separate computers chatting to one another — one of whom has cat ears on.
The guy with cat ears writes: "hehe your a cutie x3 *flops besides you and nuzzles*."
The other man responds: "nuzzles u back and pounces on u and notices your buldge 'OwO what's this..?"
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The 'OwO' s an emoticon of a cute face with the Os as the eyes and the w as a mouth or nose, New York Post explains.