Shawn Helton
21st Century Wire
Although many are still stunned in the aftermath of the Route 91 Festival tragedy – a series of unanswered questions persist following what has been described by media as the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
The motive for the Las Vegas mass shooting crime still remains unclear.
‘MANDALAY MAYHEM’ – There’s been a host of unexplained anomalies in the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino shooting massacre. (Photo illustration 21WIRE’s Shawn Helton)
The Imprint of Mass Tragedy
The recent mass shooting involving the Las Vegas Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, marks the return of heavily politicized mass shootings in America. Although America has seen a host of smaller, less sensationalized mass shootings throughout the course of 2017, including the bizarre Fort Lauderdale Airport Shooting, this latest high-profile calamity has resuscitated the trauma inducing imagery so prevalent in the post-9/11 War On Terror era. Likewise, because its unlikely aspects, combined with the sheer spectacle of the drama – one might surmise that this Las Vegas event is akin to something like “the 9/11 of Mass Shootings.”
Over the past several years, 21WIRE has chronicled many bizarre shootings and mass casualty incidents that have rippled across America and Europe. These events have become a new kind of ritualized ‘crimescape’ that has injected the masses with a host of socio-political concerns over race, religion, gun reform and security, while obscuring and obfuscating the forensic reality of the crimes themselves.
As we’ve stated before, all too often there’s a heavy emphasis on the theatrical stage-like persona of any alleged attacker or killer being touted as hard evidence. This aspect of the narrative also clouds the alleged modis operandi and can later be presented in sensationalized media as circumstantial evidence of an apparent crime, despite the fact any so-called evidence would likely result in many hours of analysis and debate, potentially without an ultimate conclusion, even if the evidence eventually reached a court room setting.
The Las Vegas mass shooting story appears to be no exception….
It’s been over a week after one America’s largest mass shootings, and we have yet to see any CCTV footage of the alleged killer’s “sniper’s nest” or his whereabouts leading up to the tragedy, as he moved in and around Las Vegas. We’re told the alleged shooter outfitted cameras around his hotel room and door, a room supposedly filled to the brim with a military arsenal. As the investigation continues to simmer, confusion over major parts of the official story, has led to powder keg of pressure that has resulted in heavy criticism from members of the public and new independent media alike.
QUESTION: Why would hotel staff not be alerted to the mounting of cameras and the massive amount of gear being brought to the room prior to the shooting massacre and why is there no footage of the apparent shooter using the freight elevator as is now claimed?
In this report we will attempt to address some of the main questions and unlikely coincidences surrounding the Las Vegas shooting. We’re told that this tragic shooting attack was carried out by one individual without a criminal past – but is there more to the story?
‘ROOM WITH A VIEW’ – Mystery shrouds the Las Vegas shooting – why is there no eye-witness testimony from guests on the 32nd floor? (Image Source: twitter)
Shooting Timeline Revised
Following a brand new press conference this week, Las Vegas sheriff Joseph Lombardo revealed a complete change in the official timeline of the October 1st Las Vegas mass shooting.
The LA Times explains the major chasm in the official narrative:
“In a timeline released last week, investigators said Paddock had stopped firing at the concert across the street at 10:15 p.m., and the first police officers arrived on the floor at 10:17 p.m. and encountered the wounded Campos at 10:18 p.m., who directed the officers to Paddock’s suite.
Police were not in a hurry to enter Paddock’s suite because the security guard’s arrival had halted the shooting, police implied in previously describing the timeline. Paddock had killed himself by the time officers entered the room, they said.
In a news conference Wednesday, Lombardo said it was his “assumption” that Paddock stopped his shooting spree because the gunman, using his spy cameras, “observed the security guard, and he was in fear that he was about to be breached, so he was doing everything possible to figure out how to escape at that point.”
All of this has transpired as media reports now state that Stephen Paddock first checked into the Mandalay Bay hotel room 135 on September 25th, not the 28th as previously reported by the police and FBI. You have to wonder what happened over those 72 hours leading up to one of America’s deadliest mass shootings, as well as question the shift in details concerning the hotel check-in date.
QUESTION: Why have authorities misled the public about the Las Vegas shooting timeline – and why did it take a so long to breach the hotel suite after police knew much earlier that a shooting had taken place inside the hotel?
The updated timeline is a major shift in the official story, as it raises questions about why law enforcement took so long to respond to the shooter’s hotel room. Furthermore, it exposes the Mandalay Bay security guard’s heroic back story which suggested he stopped the shooter from continuing his shooting massacre. In the early days of this investigation this part of the story was gleefully parroted by mainstream media.
According to authorities, the Mandalay Bay hotel security guard Jesus Campos “was alone and unarmed” when he discovered the purported shooter, facing some 200 rounds in the process, somehow surviving the massive gunfire with a minor leg injury. Based on the amount reported gunfire, the public would have likely seen heavy damage inside the hotel hallway and outside the suite in at least several areas of the 32nd floor, not to mention there would also be additional witnesses within earshot of the shooting. This is something that would have resulted in multiple 911 calls to police.
The new report concerning Campos and the shooting timeline, now puts Las Vegas officials in the hot seat, as they now have no known reason why the alleged shooter would have stopped his rampage.
Not only do these new details challenge police response time but the very nature of how the shooting started, a stark contrast to police and FBI press conference details from the beginning of this investigation. Another major aspect is the 6 minute time frame Mandalay Bay recognized a shooting occurring inside their hotel prior to the concert mass shooting. Speculation and confusion has enveloped the Campos story, as mainstream reports now state there’s an armed private security guard outside of the Mandalay Bay security guard’s home following the Las Vegas shooting.
Interestingly, the Mandalay Bay security guard who previously hailed as a hero, remains completely absent from any TV interviews.
*Update* – New reports state that Campos, who was scheduled for at least five TV interviews, abruptly disappeared prior to those appearances. One such interview included a FOX News interview with Sean Hannity. This new twist in the Las Vegas shooting adds another bizarre aspect to an already strange case. Here’s FOX News below:
“The Mandalay Bay security guard shot by Stephen Paddock in the moments leading up to the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history was set to break his silence Thursday night with five television interviews, including one on Fox News, Campos’ union president said.
Except when the cameras were about to roll, and media gathered in the building to talk to him, Campos reportedly bolted, and, as of early Friday morning, it wasn’t immediately clear where he was.
“We were in a room and we came out and he was gone,” Campos’ union president told reporters, according to ABC News’ Stephanie Wash.”
QUESTION: What’s the real story behind the main eye-witness in this case?
*Update*
Adventurous independent reportage by former Project Veritas operative Laura Loomer, reveals that the Campos family has a gag order over the Las Vegas shooting case.
This follows yet another major shift in the Las Vegas shooting timeline.
Amazingly, police have once again revised timeline details associated with Mandalay Bay security guard Jesus Campos and the alleged shooter – now stating that the guard’s encounter with the suspected gunman started near the same time as the concert mass shooting. A noticeably agitated Las Vegas sheriff Joseph Lombardo, now claims that the 9:59 time frame is when Campos supposedly investigated a nearby door alarm on the 32nd floor as previously reported – when he was shot.
Interestingly, according to a published article at the LA Times this week, a Mandalay Bay spokeswoman appeared to challenge elements of this latest Las Vegas shooting timeline but did not elaborate:
“A spokeswoman for the company that owns Mandalay Bay seemed to dispute the police timeline given to The Times on Tuesday but did not explain why.
This remains an ongoing investigation with a lot of moving parts. As evidenced by law enforcement briefings over the past week, many facts are still unverified and continue to change as events are under review,” MGM Resorts International spokeswoman Debra DeShong said in a statement. “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.
DeShong added, “It is not appropriate for us to comment further at this time on what remains an open matter for law enforcement.”
Here’s a look at Las Vegas sheriff Joseph Lombardo giving an emotive and evasive press conference on October 9th as FBI agent Aaron Rouse looms in the background…
Days ago, after several online theories emerged suggesting the possibility that multiple shooters were involved in the Las Vegas shooting, Lombardo entertained the idea that Paddock may not have been alone in the hotel suite. Since then he’s updated this theory after the October 9th press conference stating that there was “no second shooter.” This follows a week of shifting narratives, red herrings and misinformation, as its now stated police do not believe anyone else entered Paddock’s hotel suite.
In spite of the new change to the timeline, Clark County Assistant Sheriff Tom Roberts maintains that “…the hotel dispatched its own armed security team to the 32nd floor, which arrived “right around the same time” as Las Vegas police, who officials have said arrived on the floor at 10:17 p.m. But the gunman had already fired his final shots out his hotel window at 10:15 p.m.”
It’s important to note, at 10:12pm or 10:13 pm, an officer on the 31st floor reported hearing “fully automatic” gunfire one floor above him.
By 10:24 pm authorities located Paddock’s hotel suite with SWAT and remained outside the suspected gunman’s room. Interestingly, at 10:28 pm reports state there may have been a second gunman on the 29th floor but this was later believed to be an “erroneous” account according law enforcement.
At 11:20 pm, police explode the suspected gunman’s door, locating a body on the floor supposedly dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.
Based on Roberts claim above, there would have been a full 56 minutes before the hotel suite breach was said to taken place.
QUESTION: Will there be additional revisions in the official timeline to come – as this story continues to go sideways?
Here’s a screen shot of the first official timeline of the shooting in the first 24-48 hours after the incident. You have to wonder why the story has been altered so dramatically since then…
Today reported the following updated information concerning the Las Vegas shooting. Watch as Today interviews a second eye-witness in the case:
“Stephen Schuck was one of the first people to encounter Paddock when he went to check out a faulty fire exit door on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay and Casino on Oct. 1, according to a new timeline of events.
“I was about a third of the way down the hallway and I started to hear shots go off,” he told TODAY in an exclusive interview Wednesday.
Schuck then saw hotel security guard, Jesus Campos, stick out his head from a doorway.
He yelled at me to take cover, and as soon as I started to go to a door to my left, the rounds started coming down the hallway,” Shuck said. “I could feel them pass right behind my head. Something hit me in the back and I took cover.
“I tried to think, how I could get to Jesus because I could that see he was shot in the leg, and I just told myself, wait for him, he’s going to have to stop shooting some time. It was kind of relentless.”
According to reports, Schuck “calmly” called police over his radio following the apparent start of the mass shooting.
Here’s Today‘s Matt Lauer interviewing the second hotel eye-witness, Mandalay Bay hotel maintenance man Stephen Schuck…
As a barrage of media speculation continues in any high-profile case, a series of formulaic polarizing political points become an echo chamber in its tragic aftermath. This is something that rapidly descends into wild speculation which only serves to magnify any emotionally driven aspect that might later be presented as a definitive motive to carry out a crime. Very often, we’ve seen the discovery of a seemingly ready-made manifesto, laundry list of hateful rhetoric or collected material from an alleged killer retained as ironclad proof of a crime. However, current analysis of the alleged Mandalay Bay shooter has failed to yield any such results, in spite of a chorus of overzealous and misinformed reportage from both mainstream media and alternative media there has not been any concrete material linked to Paddock thus far.
It should be mentioned that there have been a bevy of accusations suggesting various political and terror affiliations from certain alternative media circles, as mainstream media continues to float the idea that Paddock may have been radicalized, due to evidence revealing a series of cruises taken the Middle East in recent years by the alleged Las Vegas shooter. But so far these claims remain unconfirmed by authorities.
Time will tell if this line of conjecture is perhaps a red-herring meant to corral and ensnare the public by way of an overtly politicized emotional appeal.
In cases such as the Las Vegas shooting, one should be careful to not jump to any conclusions, as we’ve reached the slow drip phase by which information is being conveyed by authorities and media. While law enforcement looks to tie up loose ends and shore up any early holes or bizarre theories, its possible that a more through analysis of all the forensic data in the case will be pushed into the background, as new information may be introduced to steer critics of the official story.
It is ironic that the investigation into the Las Vegas shooting, one of the largest mass shootings in the history of America, there’s been an eerie absence of conclusive evidence concerning a number of details.
Below is an inside look at the reported hotel suite that appears oddly intact considering the massive amount of gunfire said to have taken place inside on the 32nd floor area…
Adding to that, there was a delayed release concerning a mysterious document left on a table near the alleged killer’s body that contained only numbers and no letters – this was something that introduced a cryptic backdrop into the compelling crime scene. The suspicious nature of the document then became a “psychic driver” to increase speculation while introducing another unexplained element from the crime scene.
The whole circumstance took on a theatricality that could push the viewer out of a critical investigative mode and into a partially synthetic frame of thinking regarding the murky contents of the alleged communiqué.
Over this past week, reports suggested that the document at the scene may have contained calculations used by the shooter for maximum firearm accuracy. On the surface, this would appear to lend itself to the official story but in reality all it does is lead to more questions, as contradictory claims over exactly how the dramatic shooting occurred would also seem to contradict analysis of ballistics, as the amount of victims wounded or killed would most likely have been far more significant if the shooting was based on sniper-like calculations that may have made use of hundreds to thousands of either .223 or 308 caliber rounds – not to mention the possibility of a belt-fed machine gun scenario using other caliber rounds.
In recent years, 21WIRE has documented that frequently there is much more involved behind-the-scenes when it comes to high-profile attacks in America, particularly of those said to be ‘lone wolf’ variety. The incidents themselves are quickly taken out of the forensic realm despite early police reportage, eye-witness testimony or statistic improbability. In this way, the narrative gives way to a hyper-realized account that defies logic and reason.
Other recent reports reveal that the well-known casino mogul Steve Wynn, self serving or not, has shed light on the particular protocol carried out by casino employees. Below is a passage from the NY Post on this aspect of the story:
“Las Vegas casino mogul Steve Wynn suggested Sunday that Stephen Paddock would have set off alarm bells at his properties had he tried launching his mass murder from one of them.
Wynn, after whom the glitzy Wynn Las Vegas on the Strip is named, said his housekeeping staff is trained to do a visual inspection any time they enter a room, adding that a “Do Not Disturb” sign on a door for longer than 12 hours is investigated.
“The scenario that we’re aware of would have indicated that [Paddock] didn’t let anyone in the room for two or three days,” Wynn told “Fox News Sunday.” “That would have triggered a whole bunch of alarms here.”
Below is the scanner audio shortly after the crime was reported to police…
Moreover, many conspiratorial claims that have yet to still be fully explained or even be appropriately addressed by authorities have exploded on the internet. This has led to a growing speculation that has only deepened the mystery behind this America’s latest mass tragedy. As authorities have yet to uncover a clear motive for the crime, police scanner audio, along with eye-witness testimony, has suggested that multiple shooters may have been at the scene.
The amount of independent examination regarding this case thus far is fairly staggering and in the wake of any multilayered event, one must proceed with caution when reviewing the available evidence, as the doorway for a ‘trial by media’ frenzy in both mainstream media and alternative media could be used to derail sincere analysis.
Although the scanner audio is chaotic, the police dispatch communication appears to reveal some startling information contradicting the official story surrounding the Las Vegas mass shooting. While any event contains its share of confusion, the specific acknowledgement of an apparent active shooter or shooters within the fairgrounds of the concert venue, point to a deeper more complex methodology used to carry out the attack. Rather intriguingly, the scandal plagued NY Times published sections of these scanner recordings for public inspection, which could be an attempt by mainstream media to diminish or control any information regarding potential multiple shooters.
In spite of ongoing media meddling, there’s been some compelling accounts suggesting that there may have been gunfire from multiple locations by law enforcement and citizens alike. While the authenticity of these claims could be a matter of debate, these unexplained accounts have been larger ignored by mainstream media.
*WARNING* – Graphic content in the video below.
Here’s a forensic analysis from YouTube user Genesis CNC investigating the auditory anomalies at the Las Vegas shooting…
Below is episode #205 of the Sunday Wire, listen as ACR’s Hesher, Jay Dyer of Jay’s Analysis and myself, discuss larger historical themes concerning the Las Vegas mass shooting, while taking a look at the available ballistic evidence, as well as exploring the possibility of multiple shooters and other strange anomalies surrounding the case…
Listen to “Episode #205 – SUNDAY WIRE: ‘Dirty Vegas’ with Jay Dyer, Hesher & Shawn Helton” on Spreaker.
Other questions have emerged regarding the absence of witness accounts from anyone who stayed on the 32nd floor, although there’s been some testimony from other floors of the hotel, the citizen analysis below raises a few interesting points…
Let’s look even further into one of America’s deadliest mass shootings…
‘DEAD MAN’S HAND’ – The purported Mandalay Bay Shooter 64 year-old Stephen Paddock. Reports have made a vague mention of prescription medication – look for this to be a focal point when this story is revisited by mainstream media. (Image Source: kbc.co.ke)
The Las Vegas Shooter?
On October 1st, authorities revealed that 64 year-old Stephen Paddock was the suspected gunman in the Las Vegas mass shooting that claimed the lives of at least 58 people and injured as many as 527 (later downgraded to 489) at an outside concert venue on the strip. The alleged “lone wolf” assailant apparently fired down from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel at concert goers nearly 400 yards away at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival while Jason Aldean performed his headlining set on the final night of the event. Additional media coverage has suggested that the number of those said to be initially injured had decreased by at least twenty victims due to “double counting” at nearby local hospitals by October 3rd.
We’ve been told the apparently well-to-do Paddock, a well-known high stakes gambler among Las Vegas casinos, had been an accountant who was hunting enthusiast, a licensed pilot who had at least two planes and a boat, in a life filled with luxury cruise vacations.
‘ABOVE VIEW’ – This image displays the distance of the entire crime scene.
Reports have also revealed that at the hotel crime scene, Paddock was supposedly equipped with at least 23 weapons, including two tripods used to shoot out of two different windows from inside his two-room hotel suite. In addition, the LVMPD suggests Paddock loaded “in excess of 10” suitcases up to his room in the days leading up to the Route 91 concert. A raid on Paddock’s properties put the overall firearm total at 47 guns, as law enforcement also recovered a large amount of explosive material from inside his vehicle at the resort hotel. Incidentally, its worth mentioning in a week where FBI combed through one of Paddock’s properties in Reno, there was a reported break-in.
NOTE – Reports of Paddock scouting other locations prior to the apparent shooting, takes public attention away from the lack of CCTV footage, the shaky timeline details and the lack of motive in the Las Vegas mass shooting crime…
Rather intriguingly, Paddock is stated to have previously been an internal auditor for the predecessor company of Lockheed Martin during the mid 1980’s. Lockheed Martin is of course among the world’s largest defense contracting companies and has been tied to other high-profile American mysteries such as the JonBenét Ramsey case. The defense contracting and intel linked giant has not disclosed exactly which predecessor employed Paddock but the Maryland-based defense contractor was formed during the merger of Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta in 1995.
The discovery of Paddock’s employment history and his personal wealth has added confusion to the high stakes shock and awe shooting event that took place in Las Vegas this week.
Official reports also state that Paddock was the owner of a residence some 80 miles outside of Las Vegas in Mesquite, Nevada. In addition to that, according to public records, appeared live at an apartment complex he owned in Mesquite, Texas, while residing at retirement community in Reno with his girlfriend 62 year-old Marilou Danley. All in all, according media, the apparent “multimillionaire” Paddock, lived a transitory life, supposedly having some 27 different residences throughout the US.
According to additional media reports,“The 64-year-old’s friends and family said they never suspected Paddock of planning a shooting, and Las Vegas police said he was not on their radar prior to him committing the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.”
Continuing, reports also state that “…He [Paddock] also worked as a letter carrier for the US Postal Service in the ’70s, as an IRS agent from 1978 to 1984, adding to the obtuse profile of the suspected lone gunman.
On a strange note, the Las Vegas shooting story seemed to echo elements of a shooting that took place at a hotel and casino in the Philippine capital, Manila in June of 2017. What are the chances of this very odd coincidence?
‘WORLD TRAVELER’ -Paddock on an overseas trip believed to be the Philippines in April of 2013. (Image Source: ghananews)
As the media stylized profile of Paddock and those around him has grown, the FBI, police and media diverted the public’s attention to Danley, Paddock’s girlfriend, a former casino hostess who was supposedly out of the country in the Philippines at the time of the Mandalay Bay shooting. Danley’s trip was paid for by Paddock, who is stated to have also wired $127,000 to her family reportedly to buy a home.
Adding to the evidence concerning wired funds, intense scrutiny surrounded a suspicious claim that a mysterious woman allegedly gave a dire warning to concert goers some 45 minutes before the last night of the Route 91 Festival. The overlapping narratives were said not be related according to police, nevertheless the two different aspects were conflated, prompting Danley to be named a “person of interest” who was then flown back to the US for additional FBI questioning. Interestingly, some critics have questioned the validity of the warning prior to the concert due to the nature of the televised interview.
The search for Danley’s whereabouts prior to the Las Vegas shooting spanned some seven countries dating back to mid September and according to neighbors, she hadn’t been seen since August.
Here’s a passage from CNN that revealed the following details:
“Danley, 62, who travels on an Australian passport, arrived in the Philippines from Tokyo on September 15, then left for Hong Kong on September 22 and flew back to the Philippines on September 25, said Maria Antoinette Mangrobang, a spokeswoman for the Philippine Bureau of Immigration.”
The confusing dynamic prompted Danley and her attorneys to later issue a statement claiming she had no prior knowledge of the mass shooting.
On October 10th, CBS news reported the following:
“CBS News senior investigative producer Pat Milton reports authorities were continuing to comb through Paddock’s electronic devices — including a laptop and cellphone — at the FBI crime lab in Quantico, Virginia. So far, none of the devices point to a motive for the shooting rampage.”
This added to new details suggesting Paddock’s vague use of a freight elevator, something according top casino owner Steve Wynn, wouldn’t have happened at his property.
Here’s a second interview with Eric Paddock, the alleged shooter’s brother, who creates his own theory as to how Paddock may have gotten weapons up to the Mandalay Bay suite. Watch and listen to his baffling interview with media…
Other background information revealed that Patrick Benjamin Paddock (left photo), Paddock’s father, was apparently arrested in 1961 for robbing a Valley National Bank in Phoenix in 1960 – something which later landed the elder Paddock on the FBI’s most wanted list after escaping a 20-year prison term at Federal Correctional Institution at La Tuna, Texas. In 1978, Patrick Paddock was arrested in Oregon where he was running a bingo parlor under assumed identity Bruce Werner Ericksen.
The crystallization of Paddock’s surreal and hard to believe ancestral lineage creates a criminal hall of mirrors all the way from the mind bending counter-culture of the 1960’s to today’s Las Vegas mass shooting.
Very often with hyper-real crimes, there’s a stark portrait that emerges regarding any suspected killer and in the case of Paddock this was no exception. The man named as the Mandalay Bay shooter had no previous criminal record and was described as a quiet, generous man by family members and one alleged neighbor, as other media reports painted the apparent killer as someone who may have had trouble controlling his behavior, even suggesting he may have had an abusive personality in the past.
However, what seems to be missing in most of these cases, is a more balanced psychological profile of these “solo actors,” as there is usually an incomplete picture that makes little to no sense at all after only a handful of people who knew the purported murderer speak with media. Furthermore, you have to wonder why years of business associates and more acquaintances and friends have not come forward with any additional information.
Additionally, there have other suspicious sidebars concerning the Las Vegas shooting. One such story was posted on the message board and popular hacker hangout site, 4chan. The story in question was also discussed on Reddit, and was near carbon copy of story that transpired prior to the Oregon shooting at UCC.
Here’s a passage from a 21WIRE report regarding the October 1st, 2015 UCC shooting which was exactly two years to the day of the Las Vegas mass shooting:
As evidence of advanced knowledge of the Oregon shooting event surfaced on 4chan, many have become concerned and even suspicious of the claims.
The following is passage is from Salon.com that discusses the suspicious alert prior to the UCC campus shooting:
“Federal officials announced they were investigating a recent 4chan exchange that appeared to predict the rampage. In a cryptic post on the /r9k board on Wednesday, an anonymous poster with an image of Pepe the Frog holding a gun reportedly posted, “Some of you guys are alright. Don’t go to school tomorrow if you are in the northwest. happening thread will be posted tomorrow morning. so long space robots.”
4chan has been rife with controversy since its inception, as some critics think it may indeed be a limited hangout for the intelligence community. And due to the suspect nature of the website, a bevy of internet researchers have questioned the highly orchestrated law enforcement response in the aftermath of the UCC shooting via the apparent 4chan warning.
A more recent 4chan post seemed to propel additional misinformation regarding nature of the shooting.
During this same time, SITE Intelligence injected an ‘ISIS meme’ into this event without revealing any solid evidence. This then prompted an apparent ‘official’ statement that echoed those dubious claims from ISIS. So far, these claims linger though they’ve failed to produce any connection to ISIS.
As we’ve noted numerous times here at 21WIRE, the intelligence monitoring group called SITE, has ties to both the CIA and Israeli intelligence. The group has also had ethical concerns raised over the nature of their intel gathering in the last decade and according to the group’s founder, Rita Katz – they’ve managed to the release terror related material linked to ISIS prior to the group itself.
Kip Herriage a former financial advisor and venture capitalist from Wall Street published a report examining suspicious trading involving MGM on a sister site linked to his website Virtual Research Advisory. The startling passage below suggests that there was an excessive amount of shares sold off by MGM CEO/Chairman in the weeks leading up to the Las Vegas shooting.
We at 21WIRE cannot verify all of Herriage’s claims but given his background and pedigree, this post should be reviewed for further consideration, as it appears to be another strange element revealed in the aftermath of the Las Vegas massacre:
“We will examine the share price movements of two gun manufacturers (American Outdoor Brands and Sturm Ruger) and the share price movement of MGM (which owns Mandalay Bay). We will also examine additional financial events surrounding MGM, including what can only be referred to as massive levels of insider selling in the shares of MGM, by the CEO/Chairman and MGM officers/directors. As you’ll see, more than $200 million in MGM shares were sold in the weeks leading up to the attack.”
On October 2nd, there were reports that shares for Las Vegas casinos took a significant fall after the October 1st shooting.
CNBC disclosed those details:
“MGM Resorts International, which owns the Mandalay Bay hotel near where the shooting occurred, fell 5.6 percent Monday. Wynn Resortsslipped 1.2 percent. Las Vegas Sands fell as much as 2.1 percent before closing higher.”
‘LIVE DRILL’ – Las Vegas has been at the forefront of active shooter training. ( Image Source: sinclairstoryline)
Las Vegas Active Shooter Drills
Back in 2014, during another high-profile Las Vegas shooting, 21WIRE revealed that Nevada officials sought to increase their budget to thwart potential terror related activity for 2014, according to KoloTV in Las Vegas:
“Nevada’s Homeland Security Commission on Thursday approved a grant allocation plan that will increase funding for the region’s fusion center to nearly $1.1 million, up from $750,000 this year.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports Las Vegas was ranked too low on a threat assessment list to receive federal funding in the current federal budget, a move that brought swift criticism from Nevada officials.
For the coming fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, Las Vegas will receive $950,000 in the special funding. That’s on top of statewide counter terrorism funding totaling $3.5 million.”
Later it was learned that funds were said to have been allocated for 20 additional ongoing programs throughout the state.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal revealed the city’s longtime practice of active shooter scenarios started in 2009 in the wake of a series suspicious intelligence linked attacks in Mumbai, India.
“Emergency responders in Las Vegas have spent years training to respond to a mass casualty event such as Sunday night’s massacre, officials said Thursday.
We knew what to do,” Clark County Fire Department Chief Greg Cassell told reporters. “It was much grander than we ever envisioned. However, we were able to handle it because of our people, our training, our professionalism and our equipment and our relationships.”
The report continued, with a focus on specific locations for shooter drills:
“Our job is to work with all first responding agencies and coordinate a response,” Clarkson said.
After the plan was developed, emergency responders ran drills at hospitals, hotels, schools and malls.
“Because that’s where historically these things are taking place,” Cassell said.”
Here’s footage of a Las Vegas Active shooter drill taking place at City Hall in August of 2016…
Interestingly, the night of the Las Vegas shooting there have been other claims surrounding additional information concerning active shooter related activity, which could support other theories and suspicious activity said to have taken place the same night as the tragic events unfolded at the Route 91 Festival.
COINTELPRO, Gangs and Counter-gangs
Some questions have emerged from the ether of the internet concerning the FBI and the Las Vegas shooting.
Over the past several years, the FBI has been routinely caught foiling their very own “terror plots.”
QUESTION: Is it possible the FBI or any or intelligence agency played some part in the Las Vegas massacre – whether inadvertently or otherwise?
In the search for answers regarding the investigative tactics of various intelligence agencies that have come into question, there’s none perhaps more dubious than the Newburgh FBI sting that resulted in the entrapment four men who participated in a fabricated event created by the bureau.
Here’s a 2011 passage from The Guardian describing how a FBI informant named Shahed Hussain coerced four others into a fake terror plot:
“The “Newburgh Four” now languish in jail. Hussain does not. For Hussain was a fake. In fact, Hussain worked for the FBI as an informant trawling mosques in hope of picking up radicals.
Yet far from being active militants, the four men he attracted were impoverished individuals struggling with Newburgh’s grim epidemic of crack, drug crime and poverty. One had mental issues so severe his apartment contained bottles of his own urine. He also believed Florida was a foreign country.
Hussain offered the men huge financial inducements to carry out the plot – including $250,000 to one man – and free holidays and expensive cars.
As defence lawyers poured through the evidence, the Newburgh Four came to represent the most extreme form of a controversial FBI policy to use invented terrorist plots to lure targets. “There has been no case as egregious as this. It is unique in the incentive the government provided. A quarter million dollars?” said Professor Karen Greenberg, a terrorism expert at Fordham University.”
The reputation of the FBI has suffered greatly in the recent past as well as over the past couple of decades. Following the 1993 WTC bombing, the FBI was revealed to have been ‘handling’ Emad A. Salem, a former Egyptian army officer who was a prized undercover operative thrust into confidential informant status and person who played a key role in the bomb plot.
Domestically in America, it has been well documented that the FBI created a counter-intelligence program known as COINTELPRO, not only as a way to influence, but also a way to disrupt and coerce political factions from the inside out. The FBI program infiltrated countless groups and movements across the political spectrum.
According to reports these groups included but were not limited to the following, “The Black Panther Party, The Communist Party of America, the Ku Klux Klan, the Socialist Workers Party, the New Left, the Students for a Democratic Society, the American Indian Movement, the Chicano Movement, the Puerto Rican Liberation Movement, Communist groups, anti-war organizations, Hollywood stars sympathetic to these groups, and civil rights leaders.”
On March 8th 1971, “secret files” from the FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, were allegedly stolen and subsequently released to media organizations, revealing for the first time the scope of the FBI’s domestic spying and infiltration on political and protest groups in America. After two months of planning, a group calling themselves “The Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI,” decided to break-in to a small town FBI office the same night as the first historic bout between heavyweight boxers Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali at Madison Square Garden.
Some of the Citizens’ Commission members involved in the Media office burglary were never revealed and rather strangely, the case was never solved – even though 200 FBI agents had worked the case. In fact, “there were no alarms, surveillance cameras, or locks on most of the filing cabinets,” at the FBI office in Media.
The courts later ordered the FBI to reveal part of their counterintelligence program, disclosing six operations run by FBI field offices throughout the country. The documents also revealed a specific emphasis to funnel covert aid to “White Hate Groups,” from 1964-71, that largely diverted those funds to the KKK, as long as they choose COINTEL PRO targets. Similarly, FBI efforts to infiltrate New Left groups and the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) fixating on ant-war, student and feminist causes.
Between 1956 and 1971 the FBI’s controversial program influenced and radicalized hundreds of left-wing and right-wing groups to control and neutralize political dissidents across America.
Also throughout the 1960’s and the 1970’s the CIA’s Operation CHAOS “collected substantial amounts of information on domestic dissidents from 1967 to 1973,” as admitted by the CIA. The secretive intelligence operation was also related to the overseas Phoenix Program (Operation Phoenix) which was used in Vietnam to tear apart the political infrastructure through the use of informants, agent provocateurs, and targeted assassinations.
Interestingly though, the prototype for modern deep state intelligence programs goes back to the formation of the Office of the Coordinator of Information (COI) an intelligence propaganda agency in 1941 that was succeeded by Office of Strategic Services (OSS) a wartime intelligence apparatus created in 1942 that focused on psychological warfare. OSS agents also worked closely with British Security Coordination (BSC).
Similarly, on a global scale, NATO’s paramilitary-style stay-behind-armies were said to have comprised Operation GLADIO. The origins of GLADIO have been well documented and the secretive counterintelligence operation has been linked to a wave of right-wing ‘false flag’ terror attacks across Europe throughout the 1950’s into the 1980’s. The anti-communist organizational designs were directly connected to that of the CIA and MI6 in particular, with the US and British special forces reportedly facilitating the training.
From this, we can view global operations like GLADIO in addition to the post-9/11 “War On Terror” security surge as a form of ‘power politics’ used to aggressively influence the foreign policy of other nations through the use of covert militarization.
Below Dr. Daniele Ganser discusses his seminal 2005 book (above left photo), NATO’s Secret Armies: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe. Ganser asserts that covert armies were used to subvert the political interests of various nations through the implementation of a Cold-War era ‘strategy of tension’…
Here at 21WIRE, we’ve kept a running report on ‘known wolf’ actors involved in many attacks on Western soil, here’s another look at other suspicious intelligence informant and terror cases that have held that distinction over the years:
Tamerlan Tsarnaev (see his story here)
Buford Rogers (see his story here)
Jerad Miller (see his story here)
Naji Mansour (see his story here)
Quazi Mohammad Nafis (see his story here)
Mohamed Osman Mohamud (see his story here)
Timothy McVeigh (see his story here)
Salim Benghalem (see his story here)
Michael Adebolajo (see his story here)
Daba Deng (see his story here)
Elton Simpson (see his story here)
Man Haron Monis (see his story here)
Abu Hamza (see his story here)
Haroon Rashid Aswat (see his story here)
Glen Rodgers (see his story here)
Omar Mateen (see his story here)
Tashfeen Malik (see her story here)
Djamel Beghal (see his story here)
Anjem Choudary (see his story here)
Cherif Kouachi (see his story here)
Said Kouachi (see his story here)
Amedy Coulibaly (see his story here)
Hayat Boumeddiene (see her story here)
Salah Abdeslam (see his story here)
Michael Zehaf-Bibeau (see his story here)
Nidal Malik Hassan (see his story here)
Abdelhakim Dekhar (see his story here)
Abdelhamid Abaaoud (see his story here)
Samy Amimour (see his story here)
Ismaël Omar Mostefaï (see his story here)
Mohamed Lahouij Bouhlel (see his story here)
Anis Amri (see his story here)
Esteban Santiago-Ruiz (see his story here)
Abdulkadir Masharipov (see his story here)
Khalid Masood (see his story here)
Khuram Butt (see his story here)
Youssef Zaghba (see his story here)
Following America’s previous most deadly mass shooting in Orlando were reports revealing that the FBI had a close relationship with the suspected attacker through the use of a well-known confidential informant. Similarly, recent reports state that “FBI, court filings have revealed how the agency allowed an alleged ‘home grown’ ISIS attack to take place in Garland, Texas.” 21WIRE previously uncovered suspicious elements in the cartoon event in Garland back when it happened.
QUESTION: Could this have been this case in the Las Vegas shooting, or was something else at play?
Shortly after the Pulse nightclub shooting attack in Orlando, it was revealed that the suspected gunman Omar Mateen had been attending services at a Mosque, meeting with a known FBI informant named Marcus Dwayne Robertson (see left – also played role in 1993 WTC bombing). Robertson was a former US Marine turned bank robber turned radical imam. Here’s this passage from Fox News describing Robertson’s role in backdrop of the Orlando shooting saga:
“It is no coincidence that this happened in Orlando,” said a law enforcement source familiar with Robertson’s history of recruiting terrorists and inciting violence. Mateen was enrolled in [Robertson’s online] Fundamental Islamic Knowledge Seminary.
Robertson and several associates were rounded up for questioning early Sunday, according to law enforcement sources, a development his attorney refused to confirm or deny.”
Back in June of 2016, here at 21WIRE, we discussed how the most important aspect of the FBI supplied 911 transcript had gone virtually unnoticed – as there was nothing in the contents of the transcript that discussed an actual shooting occurring inside of the Pulse nightclub.
While the report was a basic outline of ‘America’s largest mass shooting‘ it failed to account for any of the shootings said to have occurred within the interior of Pulse. There was no mention of bar patrons being shot or reportedly shot at in the FBI’s official narrative. It’s as if the mainstream media and authorities left out the biggest piece of the investigation, as the implications of who shot who and when are extremely significant forensically speaking.
Even though the circumstances are different in Las Vegas and in the case of Orlando, in both events, law enforcement struggled to piece together a timeline, quickly followed by a series of revisions in the official story.
Strange Profile, Strange Coincidence?
As mainstream media and police dance around certain details that may or may not be associated with the man said to be responsible for the Las Vegas mass shooting, a mixture of raw public analysis, military expertise and online investigative work has shed light on a compelling case that could be discussed for sometime.
Here’s an interesting section from an article about two Twin Cities professors that are studying the psychological patterns of mass shootings. Here’s a passage from a recent MPR news report that suggests that Paddock’s killer profile is very unusual when compared with more than hundred case entries:
“Jillian Peterson, a Hamline University assistant professor of criminology and criminal justice, and James Densley, an associate professor of criminal justice at Metropolitan State University, hope to better understand why mass shootings happen and identify ways to prevent them.
This shooter is a little different, compared to the data we have,” said Peterson, a forensic psychologist. “He’s significantly older than average, the average age is mid-30s. Social media presence is also something we usually see, some sort of radicalization on social media or wanting to go viral on social media. In this case the shooter was not active on social media, didn’t seem to have any social media accounts.”
While some have attempted to make sense of the Las Vegas shooting tragedy, there are reports of a heavy revamp of security in the hospitality industry through the use of gunfire detection systems, X-ray, body scanners and facial recognition in the wake of this confusing, if not partly manufactured event.
The concept of a lone wolf killer in today’s world has reprogrammed the public mind just as the serial killer phenomenon did decades ago. This new fear-based saga has ushered in improbable Hollywood-style scenarios, inducing a frozen apathy across the masses – rather than looking deeply at crime scene forensics or pour over piles of collected data, these Daily Shooter crimes hold the public psyche hostage until the next unexplained mass tragedy.
Undoubtedly, modern America’s most deadliest mass shooting has left a number of questions in its wake.
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21WIRE associate editor Shawn Helton is a researcher and writer, specializing in forensic analysis of high-profile crime scene and counter terrorism investigations, and the deconstruction and analysis of the mass-media coverage surrounding those cases. He has compiled an extensive body of work covering a number of high-profile events since 2012.
READ MORE DAILY SHOOTER NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Daily Shooter Files
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