An Analysis of the Las Vegas Shooting

On the night of 1 October, a music concert in Las Vegas was interrupted by the discordant sounds of gunshots and screaming. Ten minutes of non-stop bullets fired from the 32^nd floor of a neighbouring hotel left 58 people dead and 546 injured. The mass murderer was identified as one Stephen Paddock. As is typical of spree shooters, the last person Paddock killed was himself, much before the police could approach his hotel room. Three weeks later, the American police, investigators, media and general public are still frantically searching for a motive. Why did Paddock cause what turned out to be the deadliest massacre in American history by a single individual?

This article offers my theory about the motive of this ‘lone wolf’.

Can a white man be called a terrorist?

It would have been much simpler if Paddock had Arabic features or if his name was Mohammed Paddock. The carnage could then be legally and technically called an act of terrorism; the USA could then officially send drones to some Arab geography and bomb a few hundred civilians in retaliation for this imported terror. Unfortunately, Stephen Paddock was white, very American, without any links whatsoever to politics or religion. Though ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, in this case it was an obvious lie. Most ISIS recruits are in their 20s and 3os. Paddock was 64 years old.

A completely different shooter  

Other than his pensionable age, Paddock’s complete absence from social media has left analysts dumbfounded. Paddock didn’t leave a suicide note, emails, video messages, nothing. His not having a Facebook or Twitter account could be partly explained by his age, but he could have still left an explanatory letter or clues.

Paddock had no criminal record in any State or federal data base, except a single minor traffic violation years ago.

He was rich, not in any financial difficulties. Weeks before the shooting, he had sent his girlfriend to her native land-Philippines- and then transferred 100,000 dollars in her name, an act she had interpreted as the break-up of the relationship. It indeed was his parting gift to her, but not in a way she thought.

Ben Paddock, the biological father of Stephen Paddock, was a bank robber and con man. For eight years, he was on the FBI’s ten most wanted fugitives’ list. However, he had disappeared when Stephen was seven. Ben’s wife had told the four sons their father was dead. Ben Paddock took no further part in the kids’ upbringing. It’s a moot point whether criminal genes exist and are hereditary. 

Mass murderers are supposed to be depressed or angry or mentally unstable. The investigators conducted detailed autopsy tests on Paddock’s brain to find abnormalities. There were none. Paddock possessed a normal, healthy brain.

In fact, his preparation for the shooting was methodical and systematic.  23 rifles and a handgun were found in his hotel room. Over a period of six days, he had secretly brought them in ten large suitcases. Twelve rifles were fitted with bump fire stocks, a device that converts semi-automatic into automatic weapons. The same room had tripods for the rifles to rest on, high-tech telescopic sights, a large quantity of ammunition. The entire arsenal was very expensive, top of the range. Paddock had placed baby cameras inside and outside his room for him to monitor all movement in the hotel corridors. His car, parked in the hotel basement, was full of stocks of Ammonium Nitrate (used in bombs), 1600 rounds of ammunition, and 23 kg of Tannerite (another explosive). At his home in Mesquite, police located 19 more firearms, explosives and thousands of rounds of ammunition. All guns, even the semi-automatic rifles, were bought legally. Nevada gun laws permit the buying and carrying of rifles and shotguns without permits.

The shooting was not impulsive in any way. Paddock had, over the years, systematically built up his gun museum. Six days before the massacre, when he checked in at hotel Mandalay Bay, he knew exactly what he planned to do on the day of the concert. A few months before, he had checked in at various hotels next to music festivals, presumably for reconnaissance.

A successful and rich man

To speculate on his motive, one needs to look at Stephen Paddock’s career. He was an MBA from the California State University. He worked for the Internal Revenue Service as an accountant and auditor for a few years. Disappointed with the kind of money a salaried person makes, he entered the real-estate business. Very successful at that, he was worth more than $2 million by the year 2000. His tax records show he made $6 million profits from selling some of his property in 2015.

His main career for the last 25 years, though, was gambling. He slept during the day, and gambled through the night. Paddock’s speciality was the game of video poker. This is different from the crowded tables in glamorous casinos we see in the James Bond movies. For hours, and for years, Paddock played alone in front of a slot machine. As an accountant, he had developed algorithms, and was a successful gambler. His bets ranged from $10000 to $50000. He was so loyal; most casinos offered him free hotel rooms as a reward for his loyalty. The room he had booked at hotel Mandalay Bay for a week was part of the free promotion.

He lived in various houses, but didn’t socialise with any of his neighbours. In fact, he built barricades to make sure the neighbours couldn’t see anything in his house. Since he slept during the day, his rooms were covered with thick curtains to keep the sun away. Paddock had two divorces, and a current girlfriend.

Boredom and a new challenge

Two things emerge on reading Paddock’s life history. (a) He was not social, almost a misanthrope. (b) He loved gambling and casino games. The two factors are critical when speculating Paddock’s motive.

I think Paddock was bored. Anyone looking at a five-card slot machine for twenty-five years would be. He was looking for a new grand game with much higher stakes. A game worthy of his talents. A challenge that would take him out of the dark casino room, and allow him to do something spectacular out there in the real world. He found such a game – the hunting of humans, a 21^st century sport.

Hunting of humans

The big-game hunting of humans is played on two levels-State and individual.

On the State level, when NATO soldiers use their most sophisticated weaponry in Iraq or Syria, they can fearlessly hunt human beings, most of them civilians. The soldiers are given hunting licences, and they are rewarded for the number of corpses they can produce. Sometimes tragedy strikes and the hunter himself gets killed. His family becomes the gold star family. His widow may get a personal phone call from the president of the USA.

On the individual level, mass murderers try to maximise the number of prey. I call it the “Corpse Ratio”. (Read my open diary Week 43/ 2006: the Ethics of NuclearBombing.)

11 September 2001 set the benchmark for all aspiring mass murderers. Each of the plane hijackers managed to kill 150 people. That corpse ratio statistic, 1:150, remains a record till date.

Last year, Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, 31, drove a truck into the crowd celebrating Bastille Day in Nice, France. He killed 86 people.

The previous American record was held by Omar Mateen, 29, who single-handedly killed 49 people last year in a nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

Stephen Paddock managed to beat the American record in the individual hunting competition, but he fell short of the 1:150 all time record set by the 9/11 terrorists.

As an accountant, auditor and gambler, Paddock was probably aware of these records. It is possible he died happily thinking (wrongly) he had killed far more people than he actually did.

Getting away with murder

Just like the American soldiers killing human beings in Iraq and Syria, the mass murderers usually escape any statutory punishment. They either kill themselves or are killed by the police (known as Suicide by Cop).

Social researchers have found that many normal people would be inclined to commit crimes, if there was no punishment. In a 2014 study, one third of male students at a US university said they would rape a woman if they could get away with it.

It is plausible Stephen Paddock wished to play the spectacular game of man-hunting, with no fear of jail. It’s much easier for a 64-year man to decide to end his life, than for a 29-year old, I presume. Paddock got bored at 64, but he could have got bored at 84. With his expensive rifles, he could have still managed to take part in the mass murder sport.

The lesson  

Just as in the private sector, 9/11 established a record of 1:150; on the State level, the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing had produced the best corpse ratios in the history of warfare.  If you ignore the small number of unfortunate Americans stationed there, the two bombs killed more than 200,000 enemy bodies without losing a single of their own.

As the weapons become more sophisticated and plentiful, the State actors would also aspire to improve the corpse ratio in this game of human hunting.

The current US president is 71 years old. The world’s deadliest weapons are at his fingertips. Using them is his prerogative; no punishment is prescribed for it. If he senses his term coming to an end by law or prematurely, he may be tempted to break the Hiroshima-Nagasaki record.

Just as Paddock wished to end his career and life in a spectacular fashion, so can the president of the United States of America. North Korea has 25 million people. “Totally destroying North Korea” would make the world forget Hiroshima.

Evil old men with sophisticated weapons, fearing no punishment, participating in the 21^st century human hunting sport. That, for me, is the big lesson of the Las Vegas shooting.

Ravi