Watch police video as gamblers play on during raid on Las Vegas gunman’s room
The deadliest mass shooting in modern US history is ongoing as officers move through the Mandalay Bay casino-hotel to confront Stephen Paddock.
The hustle and bustle of Las Vegas went on and gamblers continued playing, seemingly unaware that upstairs a man was unleashing gunfire in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
Police made their way across the casino floor with guns drawn. “There’s a shooter! He’s shot and killed multiple people already,” an officer shouts as he passes on the hunt for the man who killed 58 people from his high-rise hotel suite.
The officers work their way up to the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay casino-hotel. As they approach his suite from a stairwell, another officer yells “Breach! Breach! Breach!” before a loud bang and a fire alarm begins to sound.
But more than seven months after the October 1 massacre, police are no closer to answering the key question in the investigation: What led the retired accountant and gambler to do it?
On Wednesday, police released hours of footage from two officers’ body-worn cameras in response to a legal suit by The Associated Press and other news organisations.
The videos show officers inside Paddock’s room. The gunman’s body is seen on his back, clad in dark trousers and a long-sleeve shirt with a glove on his left hand. A pool of blood stains the carpet near his head.
Investigators believe the 64-year-old acted alone in the attack and shot himself before officers burst in.
The video released on Wednesday, which lasts over two hours, represents a sample of hundreds of hours of body-camera recordings. It does not provide a complete view of everything police discovered in the room.
That revelation raised questions about whether officers followed department policy. Police refused to say whether the officer would be disciplined for violating department policy.
The AP and other media outlets sued to obtain videos, 911 recordings, evidence logs and interview reports to shed light on the response by public agencies, emergency workers and hotel officials while Paddock fired for more than 10 minutes.
A preliminary report released in January said Paddock meticulously planned the attack, researched police Swat tactics, rented hotel rooms overlooking outdoor concerts and investigated potential targets in at least four US cities.
