The would-be Trump assassin sent a furious email to a man he swindled out of $3,600 in a botched construction deal last year, in which he boasted about spending time in Taiwan and Ukraine and complained about having to deal with “ungrateful, selfish, rich people.”
Ryan Routh, 58, is currently locked up in a Florida jail awaiting trial on one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and one count of possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.
Police arrested him Sunday in Florida after he fled the Trump International Golf Club in Palm Beach after a Secret Service agent protecting the former president saw the muzzle of his AK-47 rifle poking through a gap in the fence and opened fire.
Now, DailyMail.com can reveal that Routh has had multiple run-ins with police at his adopted home of Ka’a’awa, Hawaii, and that neighbours near his modest wooden house had not seen him for a month.
On Tuesday, the FBI watched as his home was searched and said the raid was the result of a sealed warrant filed in Florida.
Ryan Routh, 58, faces weapons charges for carrying an AK-47-style rifle near the boundary of Donald Trump’s golf course in Florida
On Tuesday, the FBI searched his Hawaii home (pictured) and said the raid was the result of a sealed warrant filed in Florida.
He had also earned a reputation as a tough guy for clients of his construction services company, Camp Box Honolulu, including vanilla farmer Saili Levi, 40, who hired him to convert a trailer into a mobile farm shop last year.
Levi says he paid a $3,600 deposit for the job, but that Routh repeatedly misled him and eventually cut off contact, but not before sending him a ranting email that included unhinged boasts about his attempts to send troops to Ukraine and Taiwan.
In the email, obtained exclusively by DailyMail.com, Routh begins by defending the work he had done before going on a tirade about Taiwan, telling Levi: “You disappoint me as a human being.”
He continued: ‘I spent 5 months in Ukraine last year and 3 months there this year, and 2 weeks in DC and 2 weeks in Taiwan this year volunteering and trying to provide thousands of Afghan soldiers to help win the war and I spent thousands of dollars supporting freedom, human rights, and democracy around the world and I come back to shit like this.
‘I’ve been home for less than a month and this is the quality of humanity I have to deal with: rich, ungrateful and selfish people; it leaves me speechless.
Neighbors near his modest wooden home said they have not seen Routh for about a month.
Clients of his construction services company, Camp Box Honolulu, said Routh can be difficult to work with.
Routh has a criminal record that includes arrests for everything from grand larceny to hit-and-run to brandishing a weapon of mass destruction, in his case a machine gun.
‘It’s sad that the best humans among us are sacrificing themselves and dying on the front lines, while people who don’t care are living happy, carefree lives; very sad.
‘Maybe I’d be happier dead on the front lines than dealing with rich people in fancy cars while driving old, beat-up vehicles and hoping to keep my account out of the red and have food to eat.
“If this happens, China and Russia will definitely win. You disappoint me as a human being.”
Levi said he decided to cut off contact after receiving the email and was never given his money back, nor his trailer.
He told DailyMail.com: ‘I had initially paid him to build me a shop for my business, and instead of fixing the problem or giving me my money, he decided to do neither and just sent me a nasty email.
“I decided, you know what? It’s not worth it. I’m just going to let it go. He took the trailer; he took my money.
“She told me I was a terrible human being. All I did after that was leave a review on her Facebook page for her business, just to make sure no one else was put in the same situation I was in. Then I left it at that.”
He moved to Ka’a’awa from North Carolina in 2018 with his fiancée and neighbors said they had no idea about his criminal past.
A white van in Routh’s driveway bears a Biden-Harris campaign decal.
Routh has been hit with a “driver’s license hold law,” a law unique to Hawaii that allows authorities to prevent him from obtaining or renewing his license until he pays his fines.
Despite Routh’s behaviour, Levi said he had no idea the 58-year-old would go as far as he did, telling DailyMail.com: ‘A few of us knew him from this project (the trailer conversion) and we were all surprised.
‘I mean, we knew he was a little bit crazy, but I didn’t know he was that crazy. Everyone is a little bit crazy to some degree and at the same time, he needs to have his day in court, but all the accusations against him… they don’t look good.’
Most neighbours interviewed by DailyMail.com in the idyllic town of Oahu where he lived had no idea of his criminal past which includes more than 100 charges accumulated in his home state of North Carolina.
His life of petty crime included arrests for everything from grand larceny to hit-and-runs to possession of a weapon of mass destruction, in his case a machine gun, though he never served time in prison.
After moving to Ka’a’awa in 2018 with his fiancée Kathleen Shaffer, 61, daughter Sara, 31, and son Adam, 27, he continued his pattern of getting into trouble with the law.
Routh was arrested Sunday after fleeing the Trump International Golf Club in Palm Beach.
The images revealed the backpack, GoPro camera and AK-47-style rifle that the gunman left behind.
The suspect was able to get within 300 to 500 yards of Trump and was positioned outside the club around the 5th and 6th holes.
Court records show four arrests on his record, all for traffic offenses ranging from driving without a license to delinquent vehicle taxes and not having safety papers for his beat-up white Ford F150 pickup truck.
As a result, he racked up fines totaling $280, which he has so far failed to pay, and as a result, a court-appointed collection agency has been pursuing him since April 2023, when a default judgment was entered against him.
You have also been hit with a “driver’s license hold law,” a law unique to Hawaii that allows authorities to prevent you from obtaining or renewing your license until you pay your rent.
Neighbour Ethan Dinnan, 34, told DailyMail.com he and other neighbours were shocked by the arrival of police and media on their quiet street.
She said: “I haven’t seen him for at least a month and I haven’t seen his fiancée either. It’s been crazy since this happened, people are constantly coming in and out. It’s usually very quiet.”
