AN ACT OF PURE EVIL
58 shot dead and 515 hurt
A HIGH-rolling gambler shot dead at least 58 people at a country music festival from his hotel room.
Last night President Donald Trump described the massacre – the worst in US history – as “an act of pure evil”.
Stephen Craig Paddock, 64, sprayed hundreds of bullets from 10 weapons, including multiple machine guns, and wounded another 515 people.
The victims were watching a performance by US singer Jason Aldean 32 floors below.
Many of the crowd mistook the gunshots for fireworks until they saw people dropping to the ground covered in blood.
Terrified fans ran for their lives from the automatic fire.
Police only pinpointed him after his smoking weapons set off an alarm in his room at the lavish Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas.
A SWAT team burst inside to find his body surrounded by guns and spent ammunition after he shot himself.
Paddock had been going through a divorce and recently lost his job.
The shooting started at 10.08pm on the final night of the three-day festival attended by 22,000 country fans.
Video footage showed closing act Aldean singing on stage as the first volley of bullets thudded in from two windows Paddock had smashed in his room.
As the crowd began to scream the singer and his band fled the stage and the lights were cut, plunging the arena into darkness.
Screamed
Derek Bernard, 53, from Los Angeles, said: “All of a sudden we saw the band disappearing. They were like running off the stage.
“There was a woman bleeding. That’s when we realised it was real shots.
“She just fell. She was shot. There was a lot of blood. It sounded like 4th of July – just pop, pop, pop, pop, pop – so many.’’
Professional poker player Dan Bilzerian streamed footage of himself running for his life.
Witness Russell Bleck said: “I saw a lot of ex-military jump into gear and start plugging bullet-holes with their fingers.
“While everyone else was crouching, I saw police officers standing up as targets just trying to direct people and tell them where to go. He was just spraying the crowd. It was relentless.
“There was no stopping, maybe five or eight seconds to move from cover to cover to try and get out as he reloaded.’’
Breanna Hendricks, who was in Vegas celebrating her 21st birthday, said 45 minutes before the shooting a woman had entered the crowd with a male companion and screamed “You’re all going to f***ing die today”.
“It felt like she had knowledge of what was about to happen.
“It seemed she was telling us to either warn us or she was part of it and she was telling us because she knew we were going to die. It was so scary.’’
Another witness, who was in the next room to Paddock, said the shooting was well over 100 rounds.
“We hit the floor and took cover,’’ he said. “You could smell the gun powder.”
Singer Aldean, 40, who has had 19 No1s in the country music charts, later posted a message on Instagram that read: “Tonight has been beyond horrific. My thoughts and prayers go out to everyone involved tonight. “It hurts my heart that this would happen to anyone who was just coming out to enjoy what should have been a fun night. #heartbroken #stopthehate.’’ The US Homeland Security Department said there was no specific threat to any other public venues following the shooting. Leaders from around the world – including Prime Minister Theresa May and ex-US President Barack Obama – took to Twitter to express their sympathies for the victims. Pope Francis said he was “deeply saddened”. Russian President Vladimir Putin sent condolences to Mr Trump, inset, describing the massacre as “shocking in its cruelty”. Clark County sheriff Joseph Lombardo said police had not yet determined a motive for the shootings.