Erika Kirk will come face-to-face with the man accused of killing her husband as prosecutors begin laying out their evidence in the nation’s most closely watched assassination case.Tyler Robinson’s preliminary hearing, scheduled today through Friday in Provo, won’t be a trial. Rather, Judge Tony Graf Jr. will hear evidence to decide whether there’s enough ‘reasonable suspicion’ that the 23-year-old Southern Utah man gunned down Turning Point USA’s controversial founder last year for the death penalty case against him to move forward.‘There’s no doubt that there is,’ Teneille Brown, a law professor and evidence expert at the University of Utah.Brown expects Erika Kirk’s courtroom presence will cause a distraction in a hearing that won’t invite her testimony.‘She’s been pushing for cameras in there, putting herself front and center as if she’s involved. But this is solely between the State of Utah and Tyler Robinson. She’s not a party in this case,’ she said.The hearing will be covered by the Daily Mail and livestreamed for the public.Most anticipated is the testimony of Robinson’s roommate and transgender lover, Lance Twiggs, to whom the accused shooter is believed to have confessed while on the run after Kirk’s Sept. 10 shooting at Utah Valley University. It is widely assumed that Robinson targeted Kirk, an outspoken opponent of LGBTQ rights, as a way to avenge the kind of intolerance that Twiggs and others experience.Instead of taking the witness stand in person, Twiggs will give a pre-recorded statement since he has moved out of Utah to Texas and was briefly under FBI protection. Robinson’s defense team lost their attempt to cross-examine him.Prosecutors are also expected to present DNA evidence found on the rifle recovered at the scene, surveillance footage and electronic recordings, including material from Robinson's cellphone and alleged admissions he made on Discord. Erika Kirk will come face to face with accused assassin Tyler Robinson in court this week Robinson is facing the death penalty in the assassination of Erika Kirk's late husband, conservative commentator Charlie Kirk Judge Tony Graf Jr. will hear evidence to decide whether there’s enough ‘reasonable suspicion’ that Robinson, 23, gunned down Turning Point USA’s controversial founder last year for the death penalty case against him to move forward‘I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and I'm going to take it,’ reads a note on his keyboard that he apparently left for Twiggs.'It was me at UVU yesterday. I'm sorry for all of this,’ prosecutors say he wrote in a text message to Twiggs after.Prosecutors are likely to spend much of the hearing detailing ballistic evidence.Even though a report by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives found that the shell casing matched the rifle recovered at the scene, it indicated the bullet fragment recovered from Kirk’s body came back ‘inconclusive,’ meaning examiners could neither confirm nor rule out that it came from that weapon.News reports, including by the Daily Mail, suggested that the finding excluded Robinson’s rifle.‘My expectation is that the state will want to dispel any misconceptions the public has about ballistics in the case,’ said Paul Cassell, a former U.S. district judge in Utah and now professor of criminal law at the University of Utah, noting the difference between excluding Robinson’s rifle and simply not being able to reach a firm conclusion.In late June, one of the prosecutors, Christopher Ballard, was sanctioned for explaining that distinction to news reporters and saying, ‘We have ample evidence to demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that Tyler Robinson committed this murder.’ Judge Graf ruled that Ballard’s assertion of Robinson’s guilt violated a gag order in the case.His ruling amounted to merely a wrist slap, not the sanction Robinson’s defense team wanted — which would have been to take a possible death sentence off the table. Robinson's transgender lover, Lance Twiggs, will give a pre-recorded statement since he has moved out of Utah to Texas and was briefly under FBI protection It is widely assumed that Robinson targeted Kirk, an outspoken opponent of LGBTQ rights, as a way to avenge the kind of intolerance that Twiggs and others experienceProsecutors this week also are expected to present videos of Kirk’s killing, gruesome images that Erika Kirk, Charlie’s parents, Kathryn and Robert Kirk, and any other loved ones attending the hearing may choose to avoid by leaving the courtroom.Security is expected to be extremely tight, and not just around Robinson, who has spent nearly ten months in solitary confinement. A source in Utah County told the Daily Mail that sheriffs deputies will be closely protecting Erika Kirk, who has for months attracted hecklers slamming her and her late husband’s Turning Point’s conservative politics and deriding the way she has mourned his death.Influencers, including Shawn Ryan and Candace Owens, have dissed the widow for posting on Instagram the moment when she touched her husband’s corpse in the casket.Conservative critics also have taken exception with Erika Kirk’s rapid takeover as CEO and chair of Turning Point USA. A leaked recording caught her shortly after his elaborately staged, pyrotechnic-laden funeral giddily discussing increased merchandise sales with the group’s staff and calling the service ‘the event of the century.’Legal experts expect few, if any, bombshells in court this week, assuming prosecutors outlined most of the evidence against Robinson in their probable cause statement in September.‘I’d anticipate the preliminary hearing would simply track those allegations … with no big surprises,’ Cassell told us.He expects Robinson’s lawyers to cross-examine the state’s witnesses, without calling their own witnesses or producing any defense evidence at this time.‘They’ll want to keep their powder dry and keep their options open for trial.’ Prosecutors this week also are expected to present videos of Kirk’s killing at Utah Valley University on September 10. He is pictured at the event before the fatal shooting Erika Kirk is pictured embracing with President Donald Trump at her husband's memorial service last yearRobinson’s defense team fought unsuccessfully to keep cameras out of the courtroom, arguing that the hearsay testimony admissible in the hearing could taint future jurors. Such hearsay evidence — witnesses testifying about what another person said, rather than the direct source of statements testifying — will not be permitted later at Robinson’s trial.Legal experts say it could take another year or two, at least, to actually try Robinson.‘The defense is asking for extensions on absolutely everything,’ Brown told us.Extensions are a common tactic among lawyers in death penalty cases seeking to prolong their client’s lives. If convicted, Robinson could face death by firing squad.Delays are likely to stem from the work Robinson’s defense team is doing on ‘mitigation research’ – gathering facts about his life in case he’s found guilty and his lawyers need to convince his jury to spare him from a death sentence and choose life imprisonment, instead. Their research likely involves constructing his detailed life history, documenting his mental health and digging up past abuse or traumas, researching his family dynamics and relationships with friends and lovers and showing how growing up online and playing video games may have damaged his brain.Experts say a thorough mitigation investigation typically takes at least two years.‘To me, Tyler Robinson's story is one we don’t really know yet,’ said John Blume, a lawyer who has been defending capital cases since the mid-1980s.‘It’s up to his mitigation specialists to fill in those blanks.’ Conservative critics also have taken exception with Erika Kirk’s rapid takeover as CEO and chair of Turning Point USA Robinson’s parents, Matt and Amber Robinson, are expected to come from St. George, Utah, four hours south, to attend this week’s hearingRobinson’s parents, Matt and Amber Robinson, are expected to come from St. George, Utah, four hours south, to attend this week’s hearing, as they have for most of his court appearances since September. They’ll likely be seated as far from Kirk’s family as possible, our county source told us.Erika Kirk has claimed that she forgives Robinson.‘My husband, he wanted to save young men just like the one who took his life,’ she said at Charlie's memorial service. ‘The answer to hate is not hate.’At the time of the shooting, Robinson was a third-year student in the electrical apprenticeship program at Dixie Technical College in St. George, working toward becoming an electrician.He has been the subject of far-fetched conspiracy theories in the ten months since his arrest.Among them is that he is actually a Mossad agent ordered to gun down the conservative commentator on behalf of Israel. Another claims he carried out the hit for the French or Egyptian governments. Still others insist Robinson was framed, or acted as a decoy, for Kirk's true killer who could have been working for the US deep state, Jeffrey Epstein cronies or – absurdly – Erika Kirk herself.‘It’s fitting that the killing of Kirk, an expounder of conspiracy theories himself, is drawing this spate of conspiracies,’ David Robert Grimes, author of The Irrational Ape: Why We Fall for Disinformation, Conspiracy Theory, and Propaganda, told the Daily Mail last month.A member of Kirk’s legal team said Robinson has been ‘as interested as anyone in the rumors about him.’‘The conspiracy scenarios, the depictions as some sort of millennial double agent bring a certain comic relief… and he doesn’t have much else to laugh about.’