Thousands gathered on Thursday night to remember a police officer who was one of 58 people killed by the Las Vegas shooter on Sunday.
Charleston Hartfield, an 11-year veteran of the Las Vegas Metropolitan PD who had also put in 16 years of active military service, was killed when Stephen Paddock, 64, opened fire on 22,000 people attending the Route 91 Harvest country music festival.
Hartfield, a father of two, was a ‘very special, beautiful man,’ and his death was ‘a very special loss,’ Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman told the Las Vegas Review-Journal after the vigil.
The girlfriend of Las Vegas mass murderer Stephen Paddock told the FBI he had developed ‘mental health symptoms’ and would scream at night, it has emerged.
Marilou Danley, 62, said Paddock, 64, ‘would lie in bed, just moaning and screaming, “Oh my God,”‘ according to an ex-FBI official briefed on the situation.
Investigators – who interviewed Danley after she arrived back in the US from the Philippines on Tuesday night – believe that he may have been in ‘mental or physical anguish,’ that official and another ex-FBI source told NBC News.
However, they said that detectives are still no closer to determining Paddock’s motive for the deranged shooting spree that saw him killing 59 people, including himself, and injuring 489 others.
Las Vegas mass killer Stephen Paddock (left) would scream in the night, his girlfriend, Marylou Danley (right, with Paddock) told the FBI. She said he’d had ‘mental health symptoms’. FBI say he could have been in ‘mental or physical anguish’
Danley has been speaking to the FBI since she was pictured here arriving at LAX on Tuesday night. Investigators don’t think that Paddock’s mental health had deteriorated to the point that it would have factored into his mass murder, however
Danley and Paddock had shared this home in Mesquite (pictured Wednesday; garage door was removed by police when it was raided Monday), and also lived together at other properties he had owned in Nevada and Florida
Paddock’s hotel room was filled with guns, many with bump-stocks that would allow for automatic rates of fire. This was the scene after cops busted open his door to find him dead. He killed 58 people and wounded 489 others at Sunday’s festival
Danley said in a written read out by her lawyer on Wednesday that she had no idea of Paddock’s plans. The lawyer refused to answer questions – including whether she was aware of the 49 guns Paddock had secreted in multiple properties
While Danley’s remarks suggest that Paddock was not well, investigators do not believe that his mind had deteriorated enough to set up and execute his elaborate mass-murder plan, which saw him firing on a crowd of 22,000 people at a country music festival.
Other areas now under investigation are the hour-long gap between 10:15pm, when Paddock unloaded more than 200 rounds into the hall outside his room, wounding a security guard, and 11:20pm, when police breached the room and found Paddock dead on the floor.
Paddock did not fire at all during that time. It was suggested by Las Vegas Sheriff Joseph Lombardo that he may have been trying to devise a way to escape.
At around 10pm Thursday, Valley Health System announced that eight victims were still in critical condition at its hospitals following the shooting. Valley Health system has six hospitals in Las Vegas and Nevada.
That was an improvement on Wednesday, when 58 were still in critical condition, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
The count of injured people has been lowered from 527 to 489, Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said on Wednesday. The initial figure was accidentally inflated by hospitals in the confusion.
In a statement read out by her lawyer yesterday, Danley said she knew Paddock as a ‘gentle’ and ‘quiet’ man whom she loved and hoped to live a quiet life with.
She also said she had been oblivious to the violence he had been meticulously planning, and that she was out of the country during the attack because he’d bought her a surprise ticket to the Philippines – so, he said, she could visit her family.
Danley claimed that when he wired her $100,000 – ostensibly for her to buy a house for her family – she assumed that he was breaking up with her. She said she had no idea that he was planning violence.
On Thursday, Danley’s brother in the Philippines, Reynaldo Bustos, 75, said that she had told him over the phone that her conscience ‘is clear’ over the killings.
On Thursday the number of critically injured patients in the Valley Health System hospitals fell to eight, from 58 on Wednesday. Valley Health system has six hospitals in Las Vegas and Nevada
Danley (left) told investigators that Paddock had bought her a ticket to the Philippines prior to the attack and told her to visit family there. While there she spent time with her brother, Reynaldo Bustos (right), at his home in Dasmarinas
In his native Tagalog, Bustos told ABC: ‘I called her up immediately and she said, ‘Relax, we shouldn’t worry about it. I’ll fix it. Do not panic. I have a clean conscience. I didn’t have anything to do with this.’
Bustos and his family live in Village Park, an area where middle-class Filipino families’ homes are built on lots which cost around $6,000. Danley arrived bearing gifts.
Bustos practices hilot, an ancient Filipino art of healing, and herbal medicine. He was not at home on Thursday and was treating a patient in Pampanga province, according to local sources.
He shares his home with his son Miguel and daughter-in-law Marizalyn Joy Bustos Waniwan. Along with Bustos’ work as a faith healer, the family sells duck eggs and smoked fish.
‘I saw a nice car parked on the street,’ one neighbor told DailyMail.com. ‘The next-door neighbor told me that it was Marilou.’
Danley is an Australian citizen who had renounced her Filipino citizenship, according to a local report by ABS-CBN. It is also not known precisely when she immigrated to Australia.
Her immigration status in the US has not been officially disclosed, but she married Geary Danley in 1990, and is likely to have qualified for a green card shortly after that.
A local told DailyMail.com that another of Danley’s sisters, Dolly, owned land in a subdivision called Green Breeze.
Dolly is believed to live at a gated community, around 12 miles away, where homes start at around 3 million Philippine pesos or $60,000.
Danley visited Bustos’ home; he says she told him after the Sunday killings that her conscience is ‘clear’. Paddock had sent Danley $100,000 while she was there and told her to buy a house for her family, she claims; a lot costs around $6,000
Marilou Danley (second right) is from a large family which includes her sisters Liza Werner (center) and Amelia Manango (right), both of whom live in Australia – as did she until marrying an American man, Geary Danley, in 1990. Danley said she thought after receiving the money that he was planning to break up with her
As well as speaking to Danley, investigators are also looking at ‘six media devices’ left behind by Paddock, and also exploring his web browsing history.
His web history also led to the discovery, announced Thursday, that he had apparently been scoping out other major events over the past year.
In August he booked a hotel room overlooking Lollapalooza in Chicago – the massively popular rock event that saw appearances by The Killers, Chance the Rapper and Muse, and that was visited by Malia Obama.
According to TMZ, Paddock – who lived in Nevada, 90 minutes from Las Vegas – booked two rooms at the Blackstone Hotel, overlooking Grant Park, where Lollapalooza has been held since 2005.
He made the booking using Expedia and insisted on a ‘view room’ that would overlook the festival, which ran on August 3-6, and also demanded he be notified in advance if such a room was unavailable.
However, officials said that he did not show up to the hotel for the booking.
He also researched possible locations in Boston online, according to multiple reports.
Anonymous officials said that Paddock looked for hotels near Fenway Park, where the Red Sox play and the Boston Center for the Arts.
It was not known if the gunman went as far as making any reservations, but an officer speaking to NBC News under condition of anonymity said that no hotels give a view over the park.
It also emerged Thursday that Paddock had rented two rooms at the Blackstone Hotel (left) in Chicago on August 3-6 – in time for the Lollapalooza festival. Seen right is the festival from the Blackstone. Cops said he never turned to to the booking
This view shows show Paddock would have had an excellent vantage point over the festival – and could theoretically have opened fire on festivalgoers. Chillingly, his hotel aligns almost perfectly with the Children’s Stage
‘We are aware of the media reports and have been in communication with our federal partners,’ a spokesman for the Chicago Police Department said.
‘As you saw earlier this week the city conducts extensive public safety planning and training around major events, in close coordination with our law enforcement partners, to ensure public safety.’
It was confirmed by Lombardo yesterday that Paddock had also hired out a condo overlooking another Las Vegas festival, Life is Beautiful, which ran on September 22-24.
Depending on its precise position and elevation, the condo, which he booked on Airbnb, could have allowed him to open fire on the main stage, as well as several blocks of the 15-block festival.
There are also reports that he had attempted to book a room at the El Cortez hotel next to the Ogden, although they have not been substantiated.
It’s unclear whether he had intended to attack that event, and if so why he had not done so.
Coincidentally, performers at Life is Beautiful included Muse and Chance the Rapper, who both played the main stage – and were also at Lollapalooza.
As the investigation into Sunday’s shocking events moved into its fourth day, more details emerged about Paddock’s final days – including his heavy gambling, ‘creepy staring’ and complaints about noise at the Mandalay Bay Resort the night before his massacre.
On Saturday night – the evening before he fired on the Route 91 Harvest country music festival – Paddock called in two noise complaints about loud country music being played in room 31-135, directly below him.
In the room was Albert Garzon of San Diego, who was in town for the festival with his wife and some friends.
On Thursday it emerged that the night before his spree, Paddock complained about noise from Albert Garzon in the room below. Garzon said he didn’t realize the complaint came from the killer until he saw curtains hanging from broken windows
It also emerged that Paddock would spend as much as $100,000 an hour in eight-hour stints on high-stakes video poker machines such as these. His hands would move so fast he was like a ‘stenographer,’ one person who knew him said
Garzon said that he’d received a knock on his door at around 1:30am, and a member of security told him to turn down the music because the guest in the room above had complained about the noise, the New York Times reports.
Garzon turned down the music, but it wasn’t enough – at 2am a different security guard said there had been another complaint, and so he turned the music off altogether.
It was only when he saw the curtains flapping through the smashed windows above on Monday that he realized he had been sleeping underneath Paddock’s arsenal.
Other stories began to filter in from those who had encountered Paddock – particularly in the casinos, where some said he would play $125 hands of video poker so fast his fingers looked like a stenographer’s.
John Weinreich, was an executive casino host at the Atlantis Casino Resort Spa in Reno, where Paddock went so often that – according to his brother Eric – the whole Paddock family would be given the top floor to enjoy.
Weinreich said Paddock was a ‘starer’ who could make other players uncomfortable.
‘He loved to stare at other people playing,’ he said. ‘It was not a good thing because it would make other VIPs in the high-limit area uncomfortable.’
‘One of my guests once said to me, “He really gives me the creeps.”‘
Paddock was such an avid player of video poker he would play up to 1,000 hands an hour for eight hours straight – potentially spending as much as $800,000 in a day.
Paddock would play as many as 1,000 $125 hands an hour, for eight hours straight. One ex-casino worker said that Paddock would stare at people, which would creep out other players
DailyMailTV also learned that despite having millions to his name, the former accountant was so concerned about saving money that he often ate lunch at a retirees’ center.
He joined the frail, elderly, homeless and disabled at the Mesquite Community and Senior Center in Nevada paying just $3.50 for a subsidized lunch.
Around three times a week Paddock enjoyed Mexican food, meatloaf and hamburgers while listening to cheery songs on the piano at the center.
But in contrast to the convivial surroundings, Paddock was an ‘unsociable’ and ‘quiet’ man who liked to sit alone to eat his lunch and who was ‘in a world of his own,’ other diners said.
And bizarrely, on the day Paddock drove 80 miles to Las Vegas to begin preparations for his death mission at Mandalay Bay, he popped into the government-run center to ask the cook for a recipe.
Local resident Marshall Meland, 78, told DailyMailTV that Paddock was in the center last Thursday morning but didn’t stop for lunch.
‘Instead he went straight up to the counter to speak with the cook and asked her about an enchiladas dish she cooks, he wanted to know how she made it,’ Meland said.
‘After that he left. No one took any notice of him. It wasn’t until later after what he did that we realized he drove to Vegas that afternoon. Everyone at the center is shocked.’
That shock isn’t just felt by those in Nevada, however; as far away as New York, police are now putting into place plans to avoid another attack, while the White House has suggested it might support regulation on ‘bump-stocks,’ the modifications that enabled Paddock to fire a semi-auto rifle like it was automatic.
Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway said Thursday that the White House, like Hill Republicans, ‘welcome thoughtful conversations’ on gun control matters – suggesting the White House might be comfortable with regulating bump-stocks
‘Bump stocks’ are legal and originally were intended to help people with limited hand mobility fire a semi-automatic without the individual trigger pulls required. They allow semi-automatic rifles to fire up to 800 rounds a minute, like a full-auto gun
The possibility of the Trump administration restricting access to bump-stock modifications was raised by Kellyanne Conway in an appearance on Fox News & Friends on Thursday.
She pointed to Republicans such as House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Robert Goodlatte, R-Va., who both said the same day that they will consider regulating the device.
‘Many of them are open to a conversation, we always welcome thoughtful conversations,’ Conway said, indicating the White House could give such a ban a blessing – a highly unusual step for a Republican administration.
Her thoughts – and phrasing – were redolent of remarks made by White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who told reporters: ‘Members of both parties and multiple organizations are planning to take a look at bump stocks. We welcome that and would like to be part of that conversation.’
However, Conway – always eager to stick the boot into Democrats – added: ‘I would just note for the viewers, that since bump stock has not been in the lexicon before, this is a device that President Obama’s ATF decided would not be regulated in 2010 and I think that’s an important part of this conversation.’
Conway tried the same lines on Chris Cuomo, host of CNN’s New Day but this time got short shrift, as he told her ‘a lot of this doesn’t wash.’
‘All you need to know about bump stock is that it was legal, and that’s what allowed him to lay down that field of fire. That’s all you need to know about it.’
‘There’s no thoughtful conversation to have about it. Of course it was 2010. Of course it was the Obama administration,’ he added, pointing out that bump stocks are a relatively new technology. ‘I’m saying don’t cheapen what happened in Las Vegas.’
The comments in favor of regulating the stocks made by Ryan and Goodlatte on Thursday follow those made by their GOP brethren, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D.; Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis; and Rep. Bill Flores, R-Tx.
Thune, the third-ranking Republican in Congress, said that bump-stock legislation was ‘something I think we’ll look at;’ Graham said it was a ‘good time’ for a discussion on the matter; and Johnson said, bluntly: ‘Automatic weapons are illegal. To me, that is part of that same type of process. So I have no problem banning those.’
Surprisingly, even the National Rifle Association (NRA) – which has vehemently fought gun control laws, and lobbies Congress heavily to loosen or maintain existing gun statutes – has called for a look into bump-stocks.
However, it didn’t go as far as to demand a ban.
It said the ATF should ‘immediately review whether these devices comply with federal law,’ adding: ‘The NRA believes that devices designed to allow semiautomatic rifles to function like fully-automatic rifles should be subject to additional regulations.’
But should the ATF modify federal statute to make such devices illegal, the move would circumvent Congress.
The concerns expressed by Republicans over bump-stocks echo those of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who introduced legislation that would ban the sale and possession of bump stocks on Wednesday.
‘In just nine minutes an individual was able to turn a concert venue into a battlefield,’ Feinstein told reporters at a Capitol Hill press conference, flanked by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., whose home state was rattled in 2012 by the Sandy Hook mass shooting, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., agreed with that move, and said she thought there was enough bi-partisan momentum to make it happen. However, no GOP members actively supported Feinstein’s bill on its announcement.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., introduced legislation alongside her Democratic colleagues on Wednesday to ban the sale and possession of bump stocks. The Las Vegas killer had 12 such devices on the guns found in his hotel room
Also on Thursday, some gun sellers revealed that sales of bump-stocks had gone up since they were linked to the deaths or injuries of more than 500 victims.
‘Oh, God, yes, it’s been insane. Since this story has broke, we’ve been getting about 50 people a day asking for them,’ Michael Cargill, owner of Central Texas Gun Works in Austin, Texas, told CNN Money.
He said his distributors had sold out of the modifications, too.
‘Now that someone has come out saying maybe we should ban them, they’re definitely going to sell off the shelf,’ Cargill said.
‘All the distributors are out because customers bought them all,’ said Josh Dagnese, the owner of Village Gun Store in Whitefield, New Hampshire, who sold his last bump-stock on Tuesday.
‘I am unable to reorder because of the demand,’ he said.
And Slide Fire, which sells bump-stocks, told CNN: ‘We have decided to temporarily suspend taking new orders in order to provide the best service with those already placed.’