What is irregular about the firearm? The only details I've seen are the engraving, everything else is reportedly COTS. Please give me links to the information you're looking at if I'm missing anything.

> but most young adults still lack the composure and foresight to execute a high-stakes assassination with minimal mistakes

This is conjecture, unless you can back it up with a source. The history books are filled with 22-year-old kids shooting politicians and getting away with it, famously the Red Guard uninstalled an entire government with this strategy. With a bunch of riled-up students.

I spent a lot of time at the range when I was a kid - hitting a 200yd shot from an elevated platform is not difficult with a M1903. A modern 63mm loading can easily push 3,000fps in a long-barrel rifle and if you reloaded the cartridge for a single-use assassination, I see no reason you couldn't push 5,000fps if the barrel doesn't explode from overpressure. With those kinds of ballistics its not a very tough shot unless you're shooting into a hurricane. All you need then is a hunting scope, and that can be bought for $170 in cash at Cabelas.

> Modern investigations, by contrast, often benefit from immediate CCTV, cell-data, social media, and so forth.

This I absolutely agree with. It sounds like the only reason they found him is because his friend turned in his Discord DMs, he might still be on the loose if not for the digital breadcrumb trail he left behind.

Bit of a harrowing precedent for online privacy, but I presume that will fall on deaf ears.

Not everything is about the firearm and the shot, I am more interested in everything else (all the patterns and requirements) to pull this operation, including the composure I mentioned. There are many other things as well.

> This is conjecture, unless you can back it up with a source. The history books are filled with 22-year-old kids shooting politicians and getting away with it, famously the Red Guard uninstalled an entire government with this strategy. With a bunch of riled-up students.

Sure, it is, and I cannot back it up. He was operating alone, which is much different from doing it as a team, I believe.

> It sounds like the only reason they found him is because his friend turned in his Discord DMs, he might still be on the loose if not for the digital breadcrumb trail he left behind.

I thought it was his dad that turned him in, but regardless, the Discord messages are suspicious, because he went to great lengths as to successfully complete the mission, but he would talk about it on an online platform? Something makes me skeptical about it, but who knows. It is just pure speculation from me at this point, but it does not align well with the rest of his behavior, IMO.

I get that criminals make mistakes, and perhaps it was just that. We will never truly know.