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Crime and Justice With Ashleigh Banfield
Horror On The Vegas Strip. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired October 02, 2017 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s OK!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s not OK!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Active shooter near the Mandalay Bay casino on the Strip.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A sickening tragedy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Blood splatters from people being dead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is an individual that was described as a lone wolf. I don`t know how it could have been prevented.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The massacre.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just kept firing and firing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s a nice guy. I mean, he was kind of quirky.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He doesn`t even have parking tickets. He has no criminal record.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everyone had to fall on top of each other, whether they were alive or not.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) the 32nd floor.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, HOST: Good evening, everyone. I`m Ashleigh Banfield coming to you live from Las Vegas, the scene of the largest mass shooting
in United States modern history. The statistics are staggering. The numbers are overwhelming. The scenes at the hospitals overwhelming, as
well. And this city is in a state of shock and a state of chaos. The Mandalay Bay behind me, the scene where a gunman opened fire on 22,000
people who were at a concert venue just below. In the end, 59 people so far have been listed as died, 527 people so far listed as injured.
It is just a remarkable scene at this point because there are so many scenes, four of them to report to you so far tonight. Number one, the
scene of the bloodbath itself, the concert venue. Number two, the hotel room on the 32nd floor of that hotel behind me where that gunman opened
fire with so many rounds of ammunition, they`re still counting. They`re still processing. We may never actually know the full amount of what he
was able to fire with his 10-plus weapons in that room. 18-plus weapons found in yet a third scene, a home not far from here in Mesquite, Nevada,
where they found not only those 18 weapons but a list of other things like explosives and several thousand rounds of ammunition, electronic devices
and in a car, ammonium nitrate. And if that sounds familiar, it`s what can be used to make bombs. So luckily, at least that didn`t happen.
At this point, though, there is yet another scene they`re processing up in Reno in northern Nevada, yet another home owned by this gunman, a gunman
who at this point is a mystery to so many people. Even his own brother can`t understand why his brother, Stephen Paddock, would have done this, 64
years old. His little brother, Eric, says he had no political affiliations that seemed to stand out. He had no anger issues, no prior run-ins with
the law, no military history, no indication anything was wrong, no mental health issues, and by all accounts seemed to be a guy who was wealthy,
happy and had nothing to worry about except gambling and going on cruises.
So why on earth did this happen? What on earth made him snap? We`re going to investigate a lot during tonight`s program. We`ve got some guests lined
up who know a lot about the firepower and how it was that so many people were injured before this person was cut down, or at least as thought, cut
himself down when his hotel room was breached. Just a remarkable story that we`re telling you at the same time they are still ID`ing the victims.
And believe me when I tell you that this forensic scene is going to be like none other witnessed in any city around this country because all of these
59 victims are going to have to be autopsied, and just about every one of those 527 people injured probably interviewed, as well, as law enforcement
from all over the state are trying to actually piece together the ugliest puzzle that Nevada has ever seen.
I want to play for you, if I can, the moment caught on camera when those guns -- when the gunfire and those bullets began to actually ring out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: And then the utter chaos began. Those who were injured by shrapnel or bullets, were injured by trampling or trying to just scramble
for safety over fences, limbs broken, skin torn, people just desperately trying to run for their lives.
CNN correspondent Dan Simon has been on this story all day. He`s at an alternate location nearby with the Mandalay in the background. Dan this
forensic scene and the processing, I can`t get my head around it, and I`ve covered crime for 30 years.
DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ashleigh, obviously, authorities really have their work cut out for them. This is going to be a very
lengthy investigation. I can tell you that authorities are done searching the actual hotel room. They`re done searching the 32nd floor of the hotel.
Now the focus is on the venue itself, going through the scene, really processing everything. We know at this point all of the bodies have been
recovered.
And Ashleigh, one of the important questions in all of this is, how did the shooter get all of those weapons up to his room, all 16 of them? Did he
make multiple trips? Did he have help at a certain point. Did he put a "Do not disturb" sign on the hotel room to avoid detection? That`s going
to be one of the questions that investigators are looking at.
Then there`s the question of surveillance video. Anybody who has been to Las Vegas knows that there are more security cameras here than probably
anywhere in the world. It`s obviously very difficult to avoid detection. Obviously, at the front desk, at the elevator, if he was at the casino.
Authorities are going to be poring over all of that surveillance video to see if they can gather any clues -- Ashleigh.
BANFIELD: And I`ll tell you, the FBI has asked for people from, of course, all over the world who come to Las Vegas as a vacation destination to
please help them. In fact, they released a number, 1-800-CALL-FBI, 225- 5324, 1-800-CALL FBI. If you have video, if you can help in this investigation, if you can help solve just how this could be played out,
just how many people could be killed and injured in such a short period of time.
I want to now go to Chris Kudialis, who`s a reporter for "The Las Vegas Sun." Chris, the witness accounts have been coming in throughout the day.
And it`s remarkable how similar many of them are, how so many people start with the same narrative. They thought it was part of the pyrotechnics of
the show.
CHRIS KUDIALIS, "LAS VEGAS SUN": Yes. They thought it was fireworks. They thought it was pyrotechnics. They thought it was special effects,
only to find out that, no, it was an active shooter shooting from what Sheriff Joe Lombardo said was 500 yards away across the street from the
32nd floor of Mandalay Bay.
BANFIELD: So Chris, let me just ask you. This is your town. You`ve been through this before. It`s not as though there haven`t been mass shootings
and crises before in Vegas. This is profoundly different. I can feel it as I land (ph). I can see the live shots and satellite trucks set up.
There are hundreds of journalists who have descended on this city to cover this story.
And as a local reporter, it must be personally overwhelming, as well as professionally.
KUDIALIS: It hits harder than you can imagine, Ashleigh, just knowing that this is a place where I actually covered this festival last year as an
entertainment reporter for "The Sun." I was scheduled to cover it this year until I actually went out of town, took some vacation time.
And just the thought of it, it`s so personal because you always worry, especially now when you see victims, that they`re people that you know,
friends, friends of friends, family of friends. And now you just -- it`s a matter of holding your breath as the victims` names are released, just
praying and hoping that it`s not somebody that you know or that`s close to you.
BANFIELD: Chris, I want to ask you -- one of the facts that`s come out in this story that seemed to really overwhelm a lot of people was that they
told us all it seemed like the shooting went on for 10 to 15 minutes, and yet the authorities were able to break into that room on the 32nd floor of
the Mandalay and effectively finish the job, or at least force him to finish the job to himself.
And it all had to do, as we understand, with the fire, the smoke detector because of the number of rounds that he was shooting off causing so much
smoke from his own gun, that it set off the smoke detector in his own room. Are we hearing any more about that and how fast those law enforcement
agencies were able to descend upon that 32nd floor and what they had to do when they got there to all the rest of the guests?
KUDIALIS: Great question. There`s been all kinds of statements. Joseph Lombardo, the (INAUDIBLE) biggest metropolitan police sheriff, just came
out just over an hour ago saying that, in fact, the police detected that the gunfire was coming from that room, whether it be smoke detector or
other intelligence, and sought out casino security. As soon as they went up to that room, they were met with gunfire and then ordered SWAT to come
in, who finally finished the job.
BANFIELD: Can I ask you about this, the question that so many people have had. This man`s younger brother said that Stephen Paddock was an avid
gambler, that he played hundred-dollar poker hands, video poker, and that, by his brother`s account, was a millionaire, had plenty of money and loved
to gamble. Do we know at this point if gambling plays a part in this story? Did he have a gambling debt? Did he lose it all? What caused a
seemingly normal person to snap like this and effect this much damage?
KUDIALIS: Well, we don`t know that at this point. But like you said, his brother did say he had a gambling -- an affinity for gambling. Not sure
yet on his financial records, but here in Las Vegas especially, you know, with the vices here in this city, mental health -- and that gambling
addiction falls under that category -- is a very high topic of concern. So you see people act outrageously. In this case, this is a whole new level
of acting outrageously. But a lot of times, gambling debt, other addictions like alcohol, sex, other vices, what have you, do play a part in
these kind of things. So you can`t rule it out. But I think more investigation, more information will be forthcoming with that.
BANFIELD: You know, Chris, a lot of us in New York who lived through 9/11 -- we know the feeling of having that massive local story descend on your
town. And so, listen, I think everybody watching and I think all people around the world, they feel for your city and they feel for you and what
you all are going to be going through for, you know, months and years to come. Chris Kudialis joining us live from "The Las Vegas Sun."
I want to bring in Storme Warren. Storme was on stage during this shooting. Not only did he see what happened, but he also heard a lot of
what happened. He`s a Sirius/XM country radio host. Storm, thanks for being with us. I`m just going to pull you into the shot, if I can.
Can you just basically tell me a little bit about what you went through?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)
BANFIELD: I apologize. You know, we had just gotten another guest on. Brian Claypool. I beg your pardon. Have I got Storme Warren with me? I`m
sorry, I`m not getting the direction I need right now. I`m either interviewing Brian Claypool, who`s got a personal story, as well -- all
right, Storme, are you with me? Can you hear me?
STORME WARREN, SIRIUS XM RADIO, ON STAGE DURING SHOOTING: I sure can, Ashleigh.
BANFIELD: OK. Storme, I apologize for that.
WARREN: Can you hear me?
BANFIELD: I wanted to ask about your experience. You were on stage, and you heard what everyone else heard. Take me from there.
WARREN: Sure. Sure. Jason Aldean about 20 minutes into his set, the final headliner of the three-day festival, and everything was going great.
And we just hear, Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. I thought it was pyrotechnics, thought it might have been an audio glitch from the stage.
And when there was a pause, and then it started up again and the shots lasted much longer, we knew that there was something not good happening
because we could actually pinpoint where the direction from the sound was coming from. Best guest at that time was the roof of the Mandalay.
And we just -- as soon as we started hearing and seeing the bullets starting to hit the deck of the stage and Jason and his band and crew
rushing off stage and the scramble in the audience -- PA system dumped out. No music instantly. And we knew it was a really bad scene that was
unfolding.
So we all just tried to get to safety as quick as we could and wait for those bullets to finally stop, and then we could get out there and survey
and see what happened.
BANFIELD: And Storme, you said you felt as though you could hear shells hitting the stage, but clearly, he was so far away, you know, over a
thousand feet away, do you think you were hearing shrapnel from the bullets hitting the stage?
WARREN: (INAUDIBLE) these were definitely bullets hitting. The shells would have been closer to the shooter himself. But it was the bullets that
was coming off the deck that we were actually hearing.
BANFIELD: Can I ask you, when you finally did emerge from, you know, where you were seeking, you know, shelter under the stage, was the gunfire still
going on, or did you effectively run through a dead zone having to witness what I can only imagine would just be something you`ll never forget?
WARREN: We actually waited out until we just could best assume that the firing was done, which was about 20 minutes or so of hiding behind a
concrete barricade. During that time, we saw victims being pulled from the audience backstage through a side entrance and starting to line up one by
one and get immediate attention, and with whatever we could grab, towels or water anything we could do. And then once the shooting stopped and the
helicopter started circling over Mandalay Bay and the cops arrived, we felt a tiny bit safer to go out and check out if anybody needed help.
And that`s when the true horror of this event was became apparent, when we walked out into the grass area, and amongst the beer cans and cups and
trash were bodies. And not just one, not just two, but I mean (INAUDIBLE) all the way through the entire field you could see bodies, some of them
still alive, a lot of them not.
BANFIELD: Storme, I am so sorry for what you`ve gone through. And I appreciate you taking the time to tell us your witness account. But at the
same time, you know, you will definitely need to take the time for yourself to process what you`ve been through, and know that it`s not an easy
process. Thank you, Storme.
WARREN: Thank you, Ashleigh.
BANFIELD: I want to bring in defense attorney Brian Claypool, who also was a witness to last night`s shooting. As I understand it, Brian, you were
sitting in the VIP section?
BRIAN CLAYPOOL, WITNESS: Yes.
BANFIELD: How is that different than where some of the other witnesses have told us their stories?
CLAYPOOL: Yes. The VIP section was called the Neon Lounge. It was just - - so Jason Aldean -- from Jason Aldean facing the crowd, I was just to his left. And it was a nice area about a 40-yard stretch of VIP seating. I
was actually in the front row. So I wasn`t actually exposed because I went back the Mandalay, to my room a couple hours ago. And for therapeutic
reasons, I wanted to see whether I was exposed, and those front rows were all exposed to the shooter.
Like Storme said, I heard a pop, pop, pop. Thought it was -- I thought it was fireworks because Jason Aldean was the last act. But when I looked up
in the sky and didn`t see anything, I knew something was wrong. And Jason Aldean was stuttering a bit and it slowed -- and he -- there was a gap in
his singing. I knew he was worried.
Then that next round of shots, knew it was automatic weapons, just lay face down, was trying to pull people down. They were still sitting there. They
were kind of frozen in the moment.
BANFIELD: So did you just weather the entire shooting from those VIP stands, or what did you do?
CLAYPOOL: No. So the first few shots were about 30 seconds. The never ending, pop, pop, pop, pop -- I mean, horrifying, 30 seconds laying flat
down. Then there was a pause. I mean, he must have been reloading. I then ran down these stairs. And there was a heroic young Hispanic man that
channeled about 15 of us into this little room under a bleacher that was like a little production room.
And we got in there, and one of the most surreal moments for me was I saw about five young women aged 20, 22 on their knees in a corner crying. And
I was just heartbroken at that moment. And I just -- I prayed a bit, and I told them to try to calm down. Let`s just hunker down. Let`s let this
next round of shooting happen.
You have to bear in mind we thought -- unlike Storme, we thought the shooters were on the street and just going to jump the fence and we were
done.
BANFIELD: You had no idea. You didn`t see the tracers coming from (INAUDIBLE)
CLAYPOOL: No, nothing.
BANFIELD: You couldn`t see them coming from that window.
CLAYPOOL: Nothing. It was four -- we thought -- we thought it was one shooter, two shooters, three shooters and that they were going to jump the
fence and we`re toast. So when we went in that room, it was pick your poison. Thought I made the right move, then I got in there and then the
thoughts of Orlando came up. Oh, my gosh. If he comes in there, we`re done. We have nowhere to go. The second round of shooting stopped, and I
peeked out. I felt most vulnerable. I peeked out, looked toward the Mandalay Bay, and a police officer, another heroic guy, says, Run north
right now.
BANFIELD: That fast?
CLAYPOOL: Oh, the police department, phenomenal. Phenomenal response.
BANFIELD: A lot of them were hurt, too.
CLAYPOOL: They -- they -- they deserve medals of honor. To go fight that mass shooting?
BANFIELD: I should mention that as Brian tells us this story, there were a number of off-duty, on-duty police officers not just from Las Vegas but
from, you know, California (INAUDIBLE) hearing from people all over the...
CLAYPOOL: There were people in the crowd, too.
BANFIELD: They were visiting here. And many of their departments have actually sent in notification that some of their officers have been hurt in
this shooting.
CLAYPOOL: Look, this is the darkest moment in our country. I`ve been shaking all day. But the silver lining is this is the people that also put
their lives at risk, like law enforcement people in those stands trying to help others. So hopefully, that`ll try to bring us together.
BANFIELD: I know you`re staying at the Mandalay. I think you`re what...
CLAYPOOL: 24th floor.
BANFIELD: ... 24th floor?
CLAYPOOL: I went back, and I could see the hole in the window from my room.
BANFIELD: I`m so sorry. Are you still there, or are you getting out of there?
CLAYPOOL: I`m staying there tonight. I was supposed to fly back to Los Angeles this morning, but I couldn`t get into the hotel until a couple
hours ago. So I`ll try to get some rest and then I`m going to fly out first thing in the morning.
BANFIELD: I think you need to get some rest. Brian, thank you. I appreciate it.
CLAYPOOL: Thank you.
BANFIELD: And I know that`s not easy to talk through it, but it might be just the best thing at this point.
BANFIELD: It is. Thank you for letting me speak about it.
BANFIELD: Brian Claypool joining us live here in Las Vegas with the Mandalay behind us.
Our coverage is going to continue of the horror on the Las Vegas Strip. Think about the weapons. Think about the number of weapons that this man
would have had to spirit into that hotel room over the course of days undetected, a vast cache of weapons inside that hotel room. The maids
didn`t see it. No one saw it until he opened fire.
We`re going to take a closer look at the guns he used and how they were so incredibly effective.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Could it happen? This is an individual who was described as a lone wolf. I don`t know how it could have been prevented if
we didn`t have any prior knowledge to this individual. It wasn`t evident that he had weapons in his room. We have determined that there has been
employees going to and fro from his room, and nothing nefarious was noticed. At this point, that`s what we know now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They were spraying, and we see Jason drop his guitar and take off running to the back. And the lights go out on the stage.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The shots just kept coming!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He just wanted to hit that group of people, and as many of them as possible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: Sixty-four years old, Stephen Paddock opened fire from the Mandalay Bay hotel behind me from 32 floors up and 22,000 people below him
enjoying a country music concert. The damage was unbelievable. In the end, 59 people have died, 527 people at current count are injured.
And there`s new information to bring to you tonight about just how he was brought down. It was not as simple as we first thought. Once they
established through smoke detectors because of all the smoke his weapons kicked off inside that room -- once police arrived at that room due to the
smoke detectors, they actually took fire.
So they backed off and called in the SWAT team. So what still remains to be seen -- and they`re looking over a lot of the bodycams at this point --
is whether, in fact, the SWAT teams that breached his hotel room door actually were able to neutralize him by killing him, or whether he
neutralized himself by killing himself.
Bobby Chacon is a retired FBI special agent. He joins me now from Los Angeles. Bobby, it`s hard to look at that window. I`m looking at the
pictures that we`re putting out over the TV screen, but as I was actually landing in this city just a few hours ago, we could see it from the air.
We could see it from the actual landing strip as we were coming into Las Vegas Airport. We could see that big, black, gaping hole in that window.
Want you walk me through what the firearms experts are doing right now just to figure out exactly how he was able to do so much damage in such a short
period of time.
BOBBY CHACON, RETIRED FBI SPECIAL AGENT: Oh, I`m sure they`ve figured some of it out already. We`re just -- we`re not being told it yet. What first
strikes me is that there are two windows that are punched out. And so that leads me to believe that either he had two shooting platforms set up so he
knew that he was going to have different lines of fire to impact the maximum amount of people, or one of those could have been taken out by the
explosive breach of the SWAT team.
I just don`t know that yet, but it looks like both windows were broken out in the same manner if he used that hammer tool, which leads me to believe
that this was so preplanned and he had lines of fire -- he had -- he may have had different weapons at each window so that he would go to one, pick
up one, fire it until it`s empty, run to the other window, pick that one up fire it.
I just don`t know that. That`s speculation on my part. But that`s what jumps out at me when I see those two because they`re on different corners
of that corner room. There would have been a big adjoining suite, and he could have been using two lines of fire, which means this is so preplanned
and premeditated. This man was hell bent on killing as many people as he possibly could.
BANFIELD: And Bobby, there are reports that there may have been two platforms, in fact, inside that hotel room or hotel suite, that -- you
know, a lot of the reports are very sketchy. And usually, early in the incident, they`re not always accurate, so they get tweaked and corrected
along the way. But what you`re saying seems to gibe with that. It`s always so curious as to how he may have been able to get between weapons or
at least clips.
But it does it sound to you, when you hear the eyewitness reports of, you know, shooting for 10 to 15 minutes with bursts followed by silence and
bursts yet again -- does that seem to give you some indication of, effectively, what he was able to do and how he did it?
CHACON: Sure. I mean, it definitely sounds like he was reloading or he was dropping one magazine and adding a new fully loaded magazine. I mean,
you hear how fast he`s expending his rounds. I mean, I haven`t heard weapons fire like that since I was in Iraq in 2006. I mean, this was
military precision. I mean, he was throwing as many rounds down range as he possibly could, and he was spending the minimal amount of time reloading
and moving between shooting platforms and doing his damage.
I spoke to a good friend of my wife and I who was at the concert. She`s back here in LA now and spoke and she talked me through her thing. And she
said there was never more than a few seconds, like you hear on some of the video. There was never a real lull in it. It all seemed to be functional
delays. In other words, he was dropping a magazine and reloading or he was moving from one position to another to continue firing.
You know, until law enforcement knocked down that door and took him out or forced him to take himself out, he would have kept on firing. He had
enough rounds to do a lot more damage, it sounds like.
BANFIELD: And the first thing so many people who have actually been at war notice was that it sounded exactly like the automatic weapons that are used
in a war zone. And I can tell you right now, I felt like it sounded just like the reporting I did in the West Bank. It was just so jarring to hear
that in a domestic shooting.
Bobby, stand by, if you will. I want to bring in from Atlanta, firearms expert Christopher Robbin (ph). You know, you`re a former crime lab
director, Christopher. And I want you to bring in from Atlanta, firearms expert Christopher Robinson.
You`re a former crime lab director, Christoper, and I want you to help me sort of get my head around how we determine that this could have been
automatic weapon fire or could have been fire from weapons that were made to be somewhat automated because there is something you can use to sort of
morph a semiautomatic gun into an automatic gun. Help me understand that.
CHRISTOPHER ROBINSON, FIREARMS EXPERT: Sure, yes, ma`am. The first gun that you see in front of me, this is an AR-10, which is a 308-caliber rifle.
This rifle as well as this 223 that I`m holding up now, both of these will fire 700 rounds per minute if they`re fully automatic.
If you start using trigger assembly groups, which is a trigger mechanism that you place in here, that alters the trigger mechanism making the
weapons essentially fire just like a fully automatic weapon. So you are looking at several hundred rounds per minute easily on either one of these
weapons.
BANFIELD: Several hundred rounds per minute. Is that something that I`ve heard called the bump trigger mechanism? Is that what the device is that
turns that gun into an automatic weapon?
ROBINSON: That`s correct. You have a bump trigger or you also have a bump stock that you place a stock, that you place against your shoulder. And as
you fire the weapon, the recoil of the weapon causes the weapon to essentially act just like a fully automatic weapon, yes, ma`am.
BANFIELD: So then maybe you can help me understand the difference between the 223 and the 308 which are the rifles that he was suspected to have used
in this mass killing. He was 400 yards away. By my math, that`s around 1200 feet. That is a long way to shoot. What`s the range of those weapons? And
what does that tell you about this shooter?
ROBINSON: OK. First of all, both of these weapons are lethal out to over a thousand yards. Best military usage. These are both military style weapons.
You can see this is the 308 cartridge. It`s three times as large as the 223, the smaller cartridge.
The 223 is traveling at 3,000 feet per second, ma`am. And the 308 is traveling at 2700 feet per second. So, you`re talking about 500 yards,
1200, 1500 feet, that is nothing for either one of these weapons there can be reached very easily.
BANFIELD: I`m trying to sort of look, I got a lot of sun in my eyes. Do you have a scope on that? Because if there`s a scope you can show me -- you
know, I wanted to ask you about the scope until I really thought about it.
He wouldn`t have needed a scope. There were 22,000 targets below him. Would he have needed a scope or bothered with a scope or just, you know, I hate
to suggest this sort of ramboesque behavior but it feels like that`s got to be what it was.
ROBINSON: Yes, ma`am, I think that`s what it is. There was no accuracy needed. He`s just firing hundreds of rounds and therefore he reached the
intended targets because there were so many out there, yes, ma`am.
BANFIELD: And what about the magazines? I think you might have brought some magazines with you, the dummy magazines. How quickly -- everyone talks
about the time in between the bursts of gunfire.
Most people assume that he was reloading, but it could -- you know, popping clips in, taking clips out, a skilled marksman can probably do that pretty
quickly. But we don`t know if he was skilled. Even his brother said he didn`t even know he owned guns apart from a couple handguns.
ROBINSON: No, ma`am. But you`re talking about a 30-round magazine. This is a 60-round drum magazine. It would take a matter of one or two seconds to
drop the magazine, place a new magazine in the weapon, and begin firing again. That`s why you see the breaks in the shooting. He`s reloading the
weapons and dropping one mag and going to another or switching weapons, yes, ma`am.
BANFIELD: And then one other detail that came out today, many of us know that when you`re in those high-rise hotels, you can`t open the windows. And
the police reported that he had used some sort of hammer-like device to smash out the window before his massacre. What kind of device would that
have been?
ROBINSON: They have these glass breakers that they sell now. It could have been a normal hammer, but they have glass breakers that will break out
glass very easily. It has a pointed tip. It`s designed to break out glass such as you see right there, yes, ma`am.
BANFIELD: Listen, I really appreciate it, Mr. Robinson. This has been a very difficult story for so many people to get their hands around
emotionally but also just strategically, technically, logistically how this could have happened and how someone in American could have caused this much
carnage and damage. Appreciate your time and your expertise.
[20:35:00] Thank you, sir.
ROBINSON: Thank you.
BANFIELD: I want to bring in Joseph Scott Morgan, a certified death investigator. He`s also a professor of forensics at Jacksonville State
University. So Joseph, the forensic processing on this scene has got -- I mean, it just got to be herculean.
They`re still doing it. It`s going to be a crime scene for a long time. I`m trying to get my head around the scope of what they`re doing right now,
whether they`re throwing down those orange cones because there`s hundreds and hundreds of them, or whether there`s something else that happens when a
mass shooting of this magnitude.
JOSEPH SCOTT MORGAN, CERTIFIED DEATH INVESTIGATOR: Yes, good evening, Ashleigh. The -- this is the problem. When crime scenes are processed
ineffectively, that happens as a result of poor planning. Knowing the quality of work that goes on in Vegas, I know that prior to these people
stepping on to the scene to process it from a forensic perspective planned in advance. They knew what they were going to do before they stepped out.
You said a mouthful. This is a vast scene. And you`ve got multiple scenes. You`ve got the scene in the room. You`ve obviously got this huge area that
essentially turned into a killing field below. And then the area immediately below the window is going to be key as well because as this
weapon is extending the rounds out of it, they will be ejecting into the room and some of them will have fallen down.
I`ve also got questions about the glass that was broken away. That`s going to be key. And then, you know, let`s consider this guy who is firing from
an elevated position, and if anybody`s ever been to Vegas, you know how tall these buildings are. They`re going to have to pull trajectories from
that position of the window down to every location where someone was struck by a round potentially or where they find spent rounds, where they struck
the ground or the round lying out.
That is going to paint a really big -- a vast picture as to how many rounds were involved. The killing field itself where these rounds were primarily
concentrated now will be correlated back with the number of injuries and dead that they`re having to deal with which is overwhelming to say the
least.
BANFIELD: Yes. It`s hard to hear that, but I think you sort of hit the nail on the head when you said killing field because effectively that`s what
this was, a killing field. I`m going to ask you questions after the break if you can stay with me.
MORGAN: Sure.
BANFIELD: It has to do with the number of injuries, the kinds of injuries, because not everybody was just struck with a bullet. In fact, many of the
injuries were frag injuries, when the bullet hits the concrete and blows into a bunch of frags, you know, pieces of them strikes a number of people.
I want to talk a little bit about those injuries and then how of course they go about investigating this. The autopsies that have to be done on the
dead and exactly what they do to I.D. all of these people. Our coverage of horror on the Vegas strip continues after this quick break.
[20:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BANFIELD: Las Vegas has just joined a long list of U.S. cities that have been struck by terror-like tragedy. Sandy Hook, New York, Orlando and the
people of Las Vegas have responded just like you would expect. They have come out in droves, some of them waiting up to eight hours in line to
donate blood to help in this tragedy.
Fifty-nine people killed, 527 people injured after a gunman opened fire on a concert from the Mandalay Bay Hotel. Heidi Harris is a Las Vegas radio
host. She joins me now live. Heidi, your town has responded. It`s not the kind of thing they expected, but they`ve now joined a club they never
wanted to be a part of.
HEIDI HARRIS, LAS VEGAS RADIO HOST: Absolutely. There has been so much heroism, certainly there was last night. Perfect strangers helping each
other out. People bringing their pickup trucks to grab victims and take them to the hospital. People using their bodies as human shields to help
other people they didn`t even know at the concert. So, the stories were amazing.
Obviously the tragedy goes without saying, it`s horrible. But as you mention, lines and lines of people waiting to give blood. There`s a go fund
me page that has got over a million dollars already in it in donations. People are volunteering. And, you know, Las Vegas has really come together.
This is a terrible tragedy. We`re not going to let it break us, but it`s just so, so sad for our city because this is an amazing city and generally
a very safe place to be. Who would have ever guessed a guy like this would do something like this? It`s crazy.
BANFIELD: Yes. Heidi, let me ask you a little bit about Las Vegas. People think of it as the strip, the casinos, and the hotels. And the hotels have
really sort of stepped up. Are they, as I understand, offering to help bring family members in, put them up and at least sort of help out in that
respect, just to sort of come together as a community and make this all -- this horrible situation at least work a little smoother?
HARRIS: Well, some of the hotels have stepped up. Some of the chains like Boyd Gaming have stepped up an the South Point on the Las Vegas Strip and
stations, casinos, have offered to house people, family members who come to find out if their relatives have been hurt which is fantastic.
This city gets a lot of grief. You know, sometimes we deserve it, let`s be honest. But a lot of times, we`ve really shown who we are. When a tragedy
occurs, you really show who you are. That`s what we`ve done here in Las Vegas.
[20:45:00] BANFIELD: Heidi Harris, Las Vegas radio host. Thank you so much for being part of the program tonight. I want to take another turn now
because this story takes us to several places in the country. Ray Caputo joins me now. he`s a reporter for News 96.5 WDBO in Orlando, Florida.
Why Orlando? Because the shooter`s brother is from Florida. The shooter himself had a home in Florida, lived in Florida, and a lot of the
information is coming out of Florida. So Ray, let`s start with a little bit about what Eric Paddock has been telling us about his big brother now known
as one of the most prolific killers in American history.
RAY CAPUTO, REPORTER FOR NEWS 96.5 WDBO: Well, Ashleigh, like the rest of us, he`s completely shocked. You know, there was no writing on the wall
with this. These other mass shootings like the one that happened 16 months here in Orlando like Omar Mateen, when you dig into his history, the red
flags pop up. There were no red flags. Not even his family members knew that.
You know, Eric said that he had no religious affiliations, no political affiliations. He said he did have a couple of handguns, maybe a rifle, but
no automatic weapons. Eric is shocked as well as the rest of his family. He said that if he knew that his brother Stephen was going to do something
like this, he would have tipped off law enforcement and tried to help.
BANFIELD: So I think a lot of people are trying to find out what it was that would have driven him to this kind of carnage especially since Eric
isn`t even able to sort of figure it out himself. Eric said this was like an asteroid had been dropped on his family.
And he said he had no political affiliations, he had no mental health issues, he has no military history, he didn`t seem to have an interest in
guns, at least that Eric knew of. He thought there might have been one long gun and maybe a couple of handguns when he helped move him up to Nevada. So
what exactly, you know, can we point to at this point, if nothing?
CAPUTO: Well, one thing that, you know, based on all the things that I`ve learned about Stephen Paddock is he liked to gamble. He wasn`t just an
everyday gambler. He was a high-stakes gambler. I man, we`re talking $10,000 hands, $100 dollar hands of poker. He was bragging to his neighbors
here in Melbourne area in central Florida.
They won $20,000 playing video poker and staying up all night. That could he a clue. That and the fact that he was holed up in that hotel for a
while. You know, it might have been that he just lost all of his money and flipped. But also getting back to the mental illness thing, it has been
reported that Stephen Paddock`s father was a fugitive from the FBI, on the run for many years.
And the FBI described him as a psychopath when they caught up to him in 1978 after he was on the run for years and years. He was running a bingo
hall. You know, so, they say the apple doesn`t fall too far from the tree.
Stephen Paddock`s father was a psychopath according to the FBI and he liked to gamble. Now, you know, we have Stephen Paddock who was unassuming before
this doing something that kind of falls into both of those categories.
BANFIELD: We`re looking at the old poster from sort of one of the FBI`s most wanted from Stephen`s father, a bank robber who, like you said, was
called a psychopath and a dangerous, dangerous person, escaped from prison. There were all sorts of stories that Eric said about their father, that
they didn`t grow up with him, that he was on the run most, if not all, of their lives.
Real quickly before I let you go, I want to ask you if you can tell me anything about Marilou Danley because she`s been called, you know, called
the girlfriend, she`s been called the roommate. She was definitely living in that home in Mesquite (ph) where the warrant was served. She wasn`t
there. She was overseas in the Philippines.
We are now hearing she is in Tokyo, may on the route back. But police have been clear to us that she`s been no part of this. But we`re learning from
Eric that Marilou was a great girlfriend who used to send their mom cookies. It just sounds like this is probably falling out of the sky for
her as well.
CAPUTO: Yes, I mean, before she deactivated her Facebook account, I mean, it was just an everyday person. She`s a mom, a grandmother. If you read
some of her posts, you know, she`d be just like the everyday person next door.
And, you know, we don`t know much about her. She`s from Australia. She lived in Indonesia. She`s well traveled. I believe that Stephen Paddock and
her met at the casino. She had worked in the casino. But, I mean, the FBI says that she has nothing to do with this.
Now, one way to think about it is maybe they`re suspicious and they`re going to cut her loose and kind of watch her a little closely, but the
other way is she`s just completely in shock and maybe Stephen Paddock`s life was falling apart and maybe they had problems.
We don`t really know anything about their personal relationship at this point. She was described as his girlfriend but then again, you know, she`s
overseas and he`s here in Las Vegas planning this mass attack. There was some disconnect there. We`re still looking into that.
BANFIELD: Yes. Ray, I want to be really clear. The police very early on today said she was not involved. Nothing to do with it.
[20:50:00] They tracked her down right away in the Philippines. I mean, look, if Eric had this kind of shock raining down on him about his big
brother, who is to say she isn`t just completely torn apart about what`s happened with her boyfriend of several years.
So, Ray, we`re going to watch this possible motives, whether it was love gone wrong, whether it was the gambling. At this point, these are all
speculative possibilities, but it`s a mystery to so many people here. Ray Caputo, thank you for that, WDBO.
We`re going to continue to follow the latest on the horror on the Vegas strip. And there is this one story that really hits home. People running
for their lives, then looking down to find blood on their shirts that isn`t even theirs.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:55:00] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have sight on the suspect`s door. We need to pop this and see if we can get any type of response from this guy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s like shooting fish in a barrel.
(GUNFIRE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was just unrelentless bullets.
(GUNFIRE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They just kept going and going and going.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Twenty-two thousand people running one direction.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is all other people`s blood.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: Hard to make sense of any of it but the mayor of Las Vegas at least tried by uttering these words, the acts and insanity of a madman
shall not define us. This as one hospital had 180 patients, 14 of them died. Another hospital, 104 patients. At one point, eight operating rooms
going at a time.
One of the people who did not end up at the hospital in an operating room is Sunny Oberto from Ventura, California who was here for that concert. She
joins me live now. Sunny, you were with friends at that concert. You ran for your lives and then noticed blood on your friend`s shirt. Take me from
there.
SUNNY OBERTO, WITNESSED VEGAS SHOOTING: Yes. Well, when we heard the shooting, we all dropped. We finally realized that it was rapid shooting,
we understood what was going on. We hit the ground, and we stayed there for a little bit. Then when it stopped, we got up and ran again until the
bullets came again. And so we all dropped to the floor.
And my girlfriend, she went around one way and we kind of cut through a different direction. She ended up walking through, she said there was blood
everywhere. And it was in the back tent by the Nashville stage. We had come kind of around the other band.
So she had lost her boots. People just dropped everything and ran. I had seen cell phones on the floor as I was running up. People would need them
later for emergencies. It was chaos. People were trying to help each other get through, but it was really difficult to get out of there.
BANFIELD: Sunny, I understand that you had to find refuge in the Tropicana in the safe room. You could actually see the tracers coming, the gunfire
coming from the Mandalay window?
OBERTO: We could see it when we were standing in the back by the chairs. We were in the chairs section, not all the way up front by the stage. We could
actually see the bullets coming across right when everyone realized that --
BANFIELD: Terrifying.
OBERTO: -- and you could see the smoke coming in that direction.
BANFIELD: Sunny, let me just jump back to Joseph Scott Morgan for a moment. He`s the certified death investigator, professor of forensics at
Jacksonville State University. Joe, I asked you before a break a little while back about those frags, about the gunfire that Sunny was witnessing,
those tracers coming down, fragging out on the concrete causing even more injuries. They`re going to have to do autopsies on all these people.
They`re going to have to investigate --
MORGAN: Yes.
BANFIELD: -- all of those who lived and do autopsies on those who died. How many do you suspect might have died from frag, from trample or at least
been injured from frag or been trampled or been injured just trying to jump fences et cetera?
MORGAN: Yes, this is the purpose of doing these posts, Ashleigh, these autopsies to determine what exactly the cause of death. Let me take you
back a few years when we had the Olympic park bombing in Atlanta. Keep in mind one of those deaths at the bombing site in Atlanta was actually a
heart attack, but that was ruled a homicide as a result of that gentleman`s exposure to the blast and the stampede that went on afterwards.
They`re going to have to sort all this out. Another issue here, this is mass chaos, Ashleigh, as you`re well aware of now. One of the issues here
is getting people properly I.D.`d and this is going to be a task that is monumental. We`ve got a lot of people. We don`t know that they had I.D.s on
their body, it may have been left behind. People are separated from loved ones. This makes it particularly difficult in this case.
BANFIELD: Real quickly, I want to ask Bobby Chacon. He`s a retired FBI special agent. Bobby, I got about 30 seconds left. But this happened
outside a security perimeter. You can`t check a bag for a guy who is going to fire from 400 yards away.
BOBBY CHACON, RETIRED FBI SPECIAL AGENT: No.
BANFIELD: And this has happened now at Fort Lauderdale Airport, Ariana Grande concert, Istanbul Airport. What happens now?
CHACON: Well, I can tell you this, from an elevated shooting platform, this was the worst case scenario. And with the rounds that he had, the amount of
ammunition and you heard your firearms experts say those shoot 500, 600, 700 rounds per minute.
I think the quick action of the hotel security staff and the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police, I really think saved a lot of lives. I think that
that`s no consolation to the countless families that are grieving today.
BANFIELD: Yes.
CHACON: But I can tell that the quick action of the police really saved a lot of lives.
BANFIELD: Bobby Chacon, thank you. All my guests, thank you for your help on this story. We are going to continue following this, investigating this.
Stay with HLN for the latest development in this story on the Las Vegas Strip massacre.
I`m Ashleigh Banfield. We`ll see you back here again tomorrow throughout the day and tomorrow night, 8:00 for "Primetime Justice." Please stay
tuned. ."The Hunt with John Walsh" begins right now.
[21:00:00]
END
