Stephen Paddock

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Stephen Craig Paddock (born April 9, 1953 in Clinton , Iowa , † October 1, 2017 in Paradise , Nevada ) was an American mass murderer who killed 58 people and injured 851 in a 2017 attack in Las Vegas at a music festival.

Life

Paddock grew up in Sun Valley , California , as one of three sons of convicted bank robber Benjamin Hoskins Paddock, who escaped from prison when Stephen was 15 in 1969 and was subsequently temporarily on the list of the top ten most wanted criminals in the United States . The mother had told the children that the father had died.

He graduated from John H. Francis Polytechnic High School in 1971 and attended California State University, Northridge , where he received a degree in business administration in 1977. Paddock was twice divorced and childless, at the time of the fact he had a 62-year-old life partner of Filipino origin.

After working as an accountant , including at the defense company Lockheed Martin , he moved to a retiree community in Melbourne , Florida in 2013 and in 2016 with his girlfriend to Mesquite , Nevada , where he had acquired another retirement home in 2013. He was a licensed hunter and private pilot and had no criminal record. Paddock was known and wealthy as a video poker player.

In 2011, Paddock sued the casino hotel The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas . He had slipped in a hallway there. According to the court files from the proceedings, Paddock described himself as the "greatest video poker player in the world". He “played 14 hours a day, 365 days a year, played poker all night and slept during the day”.

Neighbors in the retirement home described Paddock as a strange, unfriendly and very withdrawn man, an eccentric who avoided any conversation. In June 2017, an anxious doctor prescribed Valium to Paddock . Paddock tried in vain to rent a hotel nearby for the “Life is beautiful” music festival taking place in Las Vegas from September 22 to 24, 2017.

Mass murder in Las Vegas 2017

Paddock shot in Las Vegas on the evening of October 1, 2017 from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino into a crowd of around 22,000 people attending the Route 91 Harvest country festival in a neighboring parking lot . He had brought 23 firearms, killed 58 and injured 851 people. Paddock also shot at a multi-million liter fuel tank at nearby McCarran International Airport . A cartridge penetrated the shell of the tank but did not cause a fire; at least one more got stuck in the outer skin.

Two minutes after the last shots were fired from the hotel, police officers reached the floor in question at around 10:17 p.m. and were shown to the perpetrator's door by a security guard. After the stick was evacuated, a SWAT task force stormed the premises more than an hour later, at 11:20 p.m. Paddock had already killed himself by that time.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Roland Oliphant: Stephen Paddock: Who was the Mandalay Bay attacker and what was his motive? In: telegraph.co.uk. The Daily Telegraph , October 2, 2017, accessed October 2, 2017 . Tom Cleary: Stephen Paddock: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know. In: heavy.com. October 2, 2017, accessed October 2, 2017 .
  2. ↑ Las Vegas shooter lived in Tucson as young boy, brother says ( English ) In: Arizona Daily Star . 3rd October 2017.
  3. ^ Andrew C. McCarthy: Is the Las Vegas Mass-Murderer a Terrorist? . In: National Review . October 2, 2017. Retrieved October 5, 2017.
    James Law: What we know about Las Vegas mass murderer Stephen Paddock . October 3, 2017. Retrieved October 5, 2017.
    Gun shop owner's chilling revelation about the Las Vegas mass murderer . Yahoo! News Australia. October 3, 2017. Archived from the original on October 5, 2017. Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved October 5, 2017. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / au.news.yahoo.com
  4. ↑ a b zeit.de January 21, 2018: Gunmen injured significantly more people than previously known
    Preliminary Investigative Report of the 'Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department' (January 18, 2018)
  5. ↑ Mallory Shelbourne: Las Vegas suspect's father was bank robber on FBI Most Wanted list ( English ) In: The Hill . 2nd October 2017.
  6. ↑ Handelsblatt print: No. 191 of October 4, 2017, page 010: Assassination attempt in Las Vegas - sadness, fainting - and anger
  7. ↑ Elizabeth Chou: Suspected Las Vegas shooter graduated from Sun Valley high school . In: Los Angeles Daily News . 3rd October 2017.
  8. ↑ Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock was a CSUN graduate, university confirms (English) . In: The Orange County Register , October 3, 2017. 
  9. ↑ Who is Stephen Paddock? Las Vegas gunman's father was 'psychopathic' bank robber on FBI most-wanted list ( English ) In: The Washington Post . 2nd October 2017.
  10. ↑ Der Spiegel: Paddock was a compulsive gamer and apparently took Valium. October 10, 2017, accessed on March 24, 2020 (mkl / AFP).
  11. ↑ Stephen Paddock was prescribed anti-anxiety medication Valium which can trigger aggressive behavior four months before Las Vegas massacre. Daily Mail, October 4, 2017.
  12. ↑ Las Vegas Strip shooter targeted aviation fuel tanks, source says . In: Las Vegas Review-Journal . October 5, 2017 (English, reviewjournal.com [accessed October 16, 2017]).
  13. ↑ a b Preliminary Investigative Report of the 'Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department' (January 18, 2018)
  14. ↑ Las Vegas gunman shot security guard a full six minutes before opening fire on concertgoers, police reveal , on latimes.com, accessed October 10, 2017.
personal data
SURNAME Paddock, Stephen
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Paddock, Stephen Craig (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American mass murderer
DATE OF BIRTH April 9, 1953
PLACE OF BIRTH Clinton ( Iowa )
DATE OF DEATH October 1, 2017
Place of death Paradise (Nevada)