A shooter on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas did the unthinkable last October — as most of the world knows too well. That shooter, Stephen Paddock, stole 58 lives, wounded over 500 people, and traumatized countless other concertgoers at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival. Attorney, commentator, and Fellowship of Christian Athletes board member Brian Claypool was among the survivors of the horrific event — he was in the front row of the VIP section when the shots rang out.
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Just days after the shooting, Claypool joined fellow survivor Lisa Fine to form a nonprofit organization. Route 91 Strong’s goals from that moment have included raising funds for victims, survivors and families after the Vegas shooting; the organization also advocates on their behalf. On “The Ingraham Angle” Wednesday night, broadcast live from Las Vegas, Claypool expressed some of his most pressing concerns to host Laura Ingraham.
“Walking toward the exit of the airport, I saw the Mandalay Bay right out the window, and I had two feelings that came to me,” Claypool said. “I had anxiety. And then the second feeling was anger.”
It was Claypool’s first day back in Las Vegas since the shooting.
“I speak for all those survivors out there and all those family members who lost loved ones in this shooting.”
“Here’s what we want to know,” he added. “We want to know why the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, and why the FBI in concert with the MGM and Mandalay Bay, are scripting a narrative that this is just a lone-wolf shooting. That this is just some … depressed guy who wanted to do a mass shooting.”
“Greed in this shooting eclipses public safety. And we want answers [as to] why the MGM and Mandalay Bay did not better prepare for this mass shooting.”
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Claypool had stayed on the 26th floor of the Mandalay Bay. To illustrate how poorly he believes the security was following the incident, he reported that when he returned to the hotel to retrieve his belongings the day after the shooting, the security guard didn’t even ask him for identification. He said he just went up straight up to his room.
An attorney, Claypool represents 12 other survivors and their families. He was in Las Vegas to meet with other plaintiffs’ counsel to coordinate their efforts.
A review following the court-ordered unsealing of documents related to the case brought a number of unsettling concerns to the fore, several of which host Laura Ingraham explored with other guests on the show Wednesday night. Chief among those concerns is what role Marilou Danley, Paddock’s live-in girlfriend, may have played in the deadliest shooting in modern United States history.
It appears, for example, that Danley may have aided and abetted the murders. Tellingly, she deleted her Facebook account before law enforcement revealed the identity of the shooter. Paddock’s personal possessions included Danley’s casino playing card — and the room was switched in her name. In addition, she told authorities they might find her fingerprints on Paddock’s ammunition, as she had helped him load bullets into magazines in the past.
Ingraham’s repeated attempts to secure a representative of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department to update viewers on air were summarily dismissed.
Claypool isn’t alone in seeking answers to the many questions the unsealed documents have raised. Ingraham’s repeated attempts to secure a representative of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department to update viewers on air were summarily dismissed. Their public information officer, Laura Meltzer, said in a terse email, “No one from the LVMPD will be participating in any interviews about the 1 October incident for ‘The Ingraham Angle.’ Thank you for your interest.”
“The Las Vegas Police Department has basically gone radio-silent,” Ingraham remarked.
That determined silence may soon come to an end, however. She noted that a federal judge is currently reviewing requests from the Associated Press and others to force the release of search warrant affidavits and other important information including inventories of what was obtained during those searches.
Important unanswered questions include:
- Why wasn’t the Paddock home locked down after the massacre? The home had been ransacked before authorities could return to it.
- What became of Jesus Campos, the security guard who exchanged fire with Paddock and subsequently appeared on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show”?
- Why has the public seen no surveillance video of Paddock inside the hotel?
- Why were authorities, given the most recently released information, so quick to declare that the shooter was a lone wolf with no accomplices?
“This media blackout,” Randy Sutton said, was “inexplicable” to him, referring specifically to the sheriff’s failure to keep the public abreast of developments in the matter. Sutton is a retired lieutenant with the LVMPD and a spokesperson for Blue Lives Matter.
Appearing on “The Ingraham Angle” as well, retired LAPD homicide detective Mark Fuhrman said, “We haven’t heard from one detective yet in this, which is unfortunate.”
“We also have hundreds of civil lawsuits,” Fuhrman added, offering one theory on what may be driving the blackout. “Mandalay Bay and Las Vegas and an elected official that’s handling the investigation — the sheriff — I think there is a lot of unsaid politics going on here.”
“Conspiracy theories incubate in the absence of information,” Ingraham said. And it is in large part this reluctance to release information that has so frustrated survivors and advocates such as Claypool, who have had enough of it.
Michele Blood is a freelance writer based in Flemington, New Jersey.
(photo credit, homepage and article images: Las Vegas Remembers Shooting Victims, CC 0, by C. Mendoza / Voice of America)
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