heyman- t1_j2dm3aj wrote
Reply to comment by halfischer in MGM Resorts Sells Land That Was Site of Las Vegas Massacre by JPPT1974
it's a pretty long article. here are the relevant bits for anyone who can't figure out a bypass solution
>Paddock “had an obsession with guns” and would become angry when challenged on the Second Amendment, according to Adam LeFevre, who dated the sister of Paddock’s partner. Paddock “made it very clear he would have no part of gun ownership restrictions,” said LeFevre, who got a glimpse of Paddock’s well-stocked gun room during a tour of his home, in another interview. Indeed, by the time of the attack, Paddock had amassed an arsenal of some 80 firearms, mostly assault-style rifles, in addition to stockpiling ammunition and some survivalist equipment — another glaring attribute of the far right.
>“He was animated about the government and the tax system,” LeFevre told us in an email. “He was outspoken about the inadequacies and waste of the government.”
>Paddock’s ardent opposition to gun restrictions bled into his embrace of a number of the debunked conspiracy theories that have helped to fuel a rise in right-wing extremism in recent years, according to the statements collected by the Las Vegas police, as well as interviews with journalists.
>The month before the shooting, one unnamed associate recounted to Las Vegas police detectives that Paddock tried to bribe him into selling a gun part used to convert a semiautomatic firearm into a fully automatic machine gun, demonstrating a total disregard for federal firearms laws. When the associate refused because he said it would be illegal, Paddock reportedly became enraged and made references to a litany of anti-government conspiracy theories, including supposed plans by the Federal Emergency Management Administration to set up “detention camps” of Americans and plans for widespread confiscation of firearms. Paddock believed that Hurricane Katrina in 2005 “was just a dry run for law enforcement and military to start kickin’ down doors and confiscating guns,” the associate said.
>“He was kind of fanatical about this stuff,” the associate added, quoting Paddock as saying that “somebody has to wake up the American public and get them to arm themselves.”
>Another witness interviewed in the investigation gave a similar account of Paddock’s fixation on anti-government conspiracy theories. A 27-year-old Las Vegas sex worker, who said she spent many hours drinking and gambling with Paddock, described him as “paranoid” and said that he would often rant about the American government’s orchestration of the Sept. 11 attacks.
heyman- t1_j2dm8xu wrote
the rest of the article (and there's a lot more) focuses on the climate of right-wing attacks that we saw around the time though there is a little more background on Paddock
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