MGM Resorts Casts Doubt On New Police Timeline Of Vegas Massacre
MGM Resorts International, the company that owns the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, believes that police officials are releasing inaccurate information about the Las Vegas shooting massacre at the hotel on Oct. 1.
“This remains an ongoing investigation with a lot of moving parts,” MGM spokeswoman Debra DeShong said in the statement sent to HuffPost late Tuesday.
“As evidenced by law enforcement briefings over the past week, many facts are still unverified and continue to change as events are under review. We cannot be certain about the most recent timeline that has been communicated [publicly], and we believe what is currently being expressed may not be accurate.”
The company’s statement is in apparent response to police officials’ earlier announcement that the timeline of events for the mass shooting has changed due to new information.
During a Monday news conference, Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said that Stephen Paddock first shot at a hotel security guard six minutes before opening fire from his 32nd-floor room on an outdoor country music festival below, killing at least 58 people and injuring hundreds of others. Lombardo also said that Paddock had checked into the Mandalay Bay on Sept. 25, three days earlier than they first reported.
This new timeline replaces officials’ previous belief that the shooting was underway when security guard Jesus Campos approached Paddock’s door to his corner suite, causing Paddock to cease fire on the festival and shoot at Campos before turning the gun on himself.
An investigator told the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday that police now believe Campos, who was wounded by Paddock, first alerted hotel security officials of a gunman on the 32nd floor before the massacre began.
Clark County Assistant Sheriff Tom Roberts told the Times that Campos, who possibly used a hallway phone, “called it in before” Paddock turned his guns onto the music festival.
“He manually called down and he used his radio to call,” Roberts told the newspaper, later adding, “We just don’t know how long it took him to call. He’s getting shot at, he’s running, he’s getting shot, he finds some cover, that’s when he starts calling in.”
Paddock, a reportedly wealthy high-stakes gambler, is responsible for one of the deadliest mass shootings in modern U.S. history. On the night of Oct. 1, the 64-year-old sprayed bullets down at a crowd of 22,000 at an outdoor country music festival from a window he broke in his high-rise suite.
While firing at Campos, Paddock shot more than 200 rounds down the hotel’s hallway, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Campos was shot in the thigh.
Lombardo told the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Tuesday that investigators have been in contact with Paddock’s entire “family tree,” including his two ex-wives, combed through Paddock’s suite and reviewed security footage, but have found no information on why Paddock carried out the attack.
Police believe that Paddock was the only shooter involved. Lombardo told the Review-Journal on Tuesday that the timeline “could change even more.”
In the statement to HuffPost, MGM’s DeShong said, “We understand the public’s desire for information and the importance of getting our community and the public at large the information they deserve, and we are doing everything we can to support law enforcement’s efforts to do so. Therefore, it is not appropriate for us to comment further at this time on what remains an open matter for law enforcement.”
- This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
Powered by WPeMatico