Las Vegas shooter believed to have used hotel's freight elevator before attack

CBS ^ | 10.10.17 | staff

[pissant]

Law enforcement sources told CBS News that Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock is believed to have used the freight elevator at the Mandalay Bay hotel casino in the days leading up to last week's deadly attack.

It wasn't clear what Paddock used the freight elevator for or how often he used it.

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.

Meanwhile, billboards requesting assistance from the public have delivered a large response with callers offering possible leads and information about Paddock, Milton reports.

The FBI has more than 50 agents and personnel on site assisting Las Vegas police with evidence recovery, interviews and other investigative work.

During a news conference on Monday, authorities made a significant change to the timeline of the mass shooting, saying Paddock shot a hotel security guard before he opened fire on concert-goers.

[bigbob]

People have figured out ways of doing this a long time ago:

[bagster]

it seems like Campos is part of all this

I'm starting to believe.

[morphing libertarian]

I think if you park in the self park garage over three days you can bring a lot to your room with carts. If there are three or two shifts monitoring cameras you bring the bags up at different hours.

[sharkhawk]

I have read they don’t like to have cameras in the hallways. Too many questions to be asked about who goes into A lot of customers don’t evidence of who goes into which room.

[mass55th]

Good point. You would think that they would have a security system in place, in order to use those elevators. Unless one of the employees provided him with the card, or was offered a tip if he/she took Paddock up in one.

I read a comment by a Freeper on one of the threads that suggested his girlfriend worked for MGM. Couldn't verify it, but it was reported that he used her MGM Rewards Card.

One story I just read said that neighbors saw Paddock move a bunch of stuff out of his home...specifically, "a safe the size of an icebox," in the beginning of August. The same neighbors said he got in his silver van, drove off, and they never saw him again.

These same neighbors said that:

“I thought the whole situation was even weirder when two weeks later I then look out of my window again to see Marilou stuffing her car full of all her belongings. Over the course of three or four days it was like she was moving her entire life out of the house. She packed so much stuff not only was her car full, but it was also tied to the top of her car. After a few days of packing she too pulled out of the driveway and was never seen again."

“It was all very strange.”

The above comments are from a Gateway Pundit article dated today (10/10/17). Here's the link to the story:

Marilou Danley Is Lying=> Neighbors Say She Moved ALL OF HER BELONGINGS Out of House in August

[redgolum]

I have, but only in a convention

Do they use elevators in a fire? That is explicitly forbidden where I stay, but most of the hotels are not high rises.

[mosesdapoet]

Why this speculation ? Vegas is a union town SEIU runs it and probably has an Elevators Operators local in Vegas. Most freight elevators in large hotels are manually operated.

[Daffynition]

This isn't very hard to figure out. You don't even have to disassemble the long gun.

[morphing libertarian]

they say no. But I was in the Lord baltimore Hotel i think 1979 and they used the service elevator while we all scrambled down the stairs to the lobby. The firs was in one corner of the hotel and the elevator opposite side. And the stairwell crowded with everyone going down.

[livius]

Whatever he used, every hotel has cameras up one side and down the other now, so he must be on video and I can’t understand why it should be this hard to track his movements in the hotel. I think they probably upload the videos and keep them for at least awhile, simply to protect themselves from legal liability from faux claims by gold-digging guests.

So unless this hotel had very unusual and secretive procedures, there’s a record of him and his movements.

[CivilWarBrewing]

I would imagine the victims’ attorneys are smiling from ear to ear upon hearing this news.

[MeganC]

“I see people wondering about how he got all the guns up to the room...”

You pay $100 to a valet. That simple. Mystery solved.

[Liz]

You have to factor in that casinos make those rules with an eye to preventing robberies....not mass shootings.

[SSS Two]

Not worthy of a separate post, so I'll just leave this here:

On Tuesday, Las Vegas Metro Police Undersheriff Kevin McMahill helped detail more about Campos' actions the night of the attack, helping fill in some of what happened ahead of the attack.

He told KNPR, a local NPR affiliate, that Campos went up to the 32nd floor to investigate a door alarm. While on the 32nd floor, he found that a stairwell door was jammed and radioed down to maintenance.

Campos heard a drilling sound and thought it was odd. A maintenance worker came up to the 32nd floor. As the pair started talking, Paddock began firing through the door of his room, first with a single-fire gun and then with a rapid-fire rifle.

Link

[Kommodor]

Great pic ... somebody really needs to shop Hill’s “duh” face onto it, though. :)

[Yo-Yo]

In Steve Wynn's interview on Fox News Sunday, he mentions that in his hotels nobody would ever be allowed on the service elevators unless accompanied by hotel security.

Chris Wallace interrupts Wynn and asks "did he (Paddock) go in the service elevator, Steve?"

At that point Wynn backtracks, and I believe he was briefed on Paddock using the freight elevator at the Mandalay Bay, but wasn't supposed to release that information.

I think that's why the freight elevator information came out now. Steve Wynn spilled the beans.

Wynn's statement is at 7:14 in this clip: http://video.foxnews.com/v/5601878272001/?#sp=show-clips

[Enchante]

I thought these casino hotels were supposed to be so full of video surveillance..... they are saying “believed to have” so that implies they don’t “know” i.e., they have no video evidence relating to the areas around the freight elevator(s). That surprises me, because aside from such extreme security/safety situations of stopping mass murderers, I would think criminal enterprises such as theft rings could utilize the freight elevators. “Dirty” employees could utilize the freight elevators for contraband etc. It seems amazing that they don’t have video surveillance there.

[Enchante]

I thought these casino hotels were supposed to be so full of video surveillance..... they are saying “believed to have” so that implies they don’t “know” i.e., they have no video evidence relating to the areas around the freight elevator(s). That surprises me, because aside from such extreme security/safety situations of stopping mass murderers, I would think criminal enterprises such as theft rings could utilize the freight elevators. “Dirty” employees could utilize the freight elevators for contraband etc. It seems amazing that they don’t have video surveillance there.

[NautiNurse]

I haven’t read anything about if they had to breach that door.

The ad hoc LEO team that breached the shooter's room arrived on the 32nd floor via the stairwell. There was a steel plate barring the stairwell door installed by Paddock. One member of the LEO team was SWAT. He had a crowbar and removed the steel bar. The SWAT member also had the explosive equipment to breach the perp's room door.

[mass55th]

When I started working at Auburn Prison (NY State) as a C.O. in 1980, we were told a story of how an inmate would have his girlfriend buy a big industrial sized jar of olives, unscrew the cap, empty the brine, and fill it back up with vodka, gin or other clear booze, and either send it to him in a package, or bring it with her and leave it with the Package Room for clearance. That happened when they were still allowing glass jars into the prison, and the checking of packages wasn't as sophisticated as it is today.

Robert Garrow was a serial killer in NY State. He murdered four people in July 1973, including a young woman whom he kidnapped, and repeatedly raped before killing, and a high school-aged camper in the Adirondacks a few days later. He was on the run for 12 days, but was tracked down, shot in the foot, arm, and back by a Conservation Officer in the Adirondacks, then claimed he was paralyzed because of it. He was found guilty and sentenced to 25 years to life, and sent to Clinton Correctional Facility (Dannemora).

Garrow repeatedly asked for transfer to the Elderly and Handicapped Unit (minimum security) within the medium-security Fishkill Correctional Facility downstate. Doctors confirmed his paralysis, and he was eventually transferred there. Of course Garrow wasn't really paralyzed, and Garrow's son Danny would come to visit his father, and bring him tubs of fried chicken. We were told that the .32 caliber pistol he escaped with, had been broken down, and the parts brought in on various visits, but it's also been reported that his son brought the whole weapon in on one visit. Garrow escaped on September 8th, 1978, by scaling a fifteen foot fence to escape the prison grounds. But again, he was tracked down, shot and killed on September 11, 1978. When I worked at Auburn Prison, his son Danny Garrow was doing time for aiding in his father's escape. I can't remember what his sentence was, but he was a scruffy-looking, long-haired blonde with a beard and mustache. I was at Auburn from 1980-83 before transferring to a prison closer to home. Retired in 2003.