Vegas shooter had interest in guns, video poker, real estate,
Expert: He didn’t seemlike typical massmurderer.
Stephen MESQUITE, NEV. — Paddock had a penchant for guns, high-limit video poker and real estate deals. His father was a notorious fugitive bank robber. He had a recent live-in girlfriend and two ex-wives and seemed to live a comfortable life in a Nevada retirement community.
His life is the subject of a sprawling investigation into what drove him to show up at the Mandalay BayHotel and Casino with at least 10 suitcases filledwith guns and open fire fromhis 32nd floor suite on a countrymusic festival, killing 59 people and injuring nearly 530. Law enforcement and family members could not explainwhatwouldmotivate a one-time accountant with no knowncriminal record to inflict somuch carnage. Las Vegas police said he had 23 guns at the hotel, including semiautomatic rifles, and 19 at his home along with thousands of rounds of ammunition.
The 64-year-old gunman killed himself in the hotel room before authorities arrived.
On the surface, Paddock didn’t seem like a typical mass murderer, said Clint Van Zandt, a former FBI hostage negotiator and supervisor in the bureau’s behavioral science unit. Paddock is much older than the typical shooter andwas not known to be suffering from mental illness.
“My challenge is, I don’t see any of the classic indicators, so far, that would suggest, ‘OK, he’s on the road either to suicide or homicide or both,” Van Zandt said.
Nevertheless, his actions suggest that he had planned the attacks for at least a period of days.
Some of the rifles had scopes, the sheriff said. And authorities found two gun stocks that could have let him modify weapons to make them fully automatic, according totwoU.S. officials briefed by lawenforcement who spoke on condition of anonymitybecausetheinvestigation is still unfolding.
“He knewwhathewanted to do. He knew how he was going to do it, and it doesn’t seem like he had any kind of escape plan at all,” Van Zandt said.
Asked about a potential motive, Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said he could not “get into the mind of a psychopath at this point.”
“I can’t even make something up,” his bewildered brother, Eric Paddock, told reportersMonday. “There’s just nothing.”
Public records offered no hint of financial distress or criminal history, thoughmultiple people who knew him said he was a big gambler.
“No affiliation, no religion, no politics. He never cared about any of that stuff,” Eric Paddock said as he alternatelyweptandshouted.“He was a guy who had money. Hewent on cruises and gambled.”
Eric Paddock also told The Associated Press that he had not talked to his brother in six months and last heard from him when Stephen checked in briefly by text message after Hurricane Irma. Their mother spoke with him about two weeks ago, andwhen he found out recently that she needed a walker, he sent her one, Eric Paddock said.
Eric Paddock recalled receiving a recent text from his brother showing “a picture that he won $40,000 on a slot machine. But that’s the way he played.”
He described his brother as a multimillionaire and said they had business dealings and owned property together. He said hewas not aware that his brother had gambling debts.
“He had substantial wealth. He’d tell me when he’d win. He’d grousewhen he’d lost. He never said he’d lost $4 million or something. I think he would have told me.”