Before I begin, let me re-emphasize what I stated in a post the afternoon after the shooting. Do not read this post as implying any sort of conspiracy theory. In fact, even now — more than two weeks after the terrible event — we don’t even know enough facts to concoct a conspiracy. We do know, however, that the story keeps getting more bizarre.
Remember the heroic security guard who allegedly helped stop the shooting? He appears to have, well, vanished. Here’s the Los Angeles Times:
The story seemed straightforward: The unarmed security guard approached Stephen Paddock’s room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, distracting the gunman and potentially saving lives.
With a gunshot wound to his leg, he helped point officers to the gunman’s location and stayed behind to evacuate hotel guests.
He was hailed a hero by many, even as the story changed. Twice.
Now, the man that many want to honor and who can help bring clarity about the timeline of the shooting has vanished from the public eye, less than two weeks since the Oct. 1 massacre, which left 58 people dead and more than 500 others injured.
Just before Campos was scheduled to appear at numerous media interviews, he allegedly went to a “Quick Care” health care clinic and hasn’t been seen since. There was an armed security guard outside his house, and now that guard is reportedly gone. No one seems to be suspecting foul play, and as the president of his union notes, “Somebody knows where he is.” But this elusiveness is obviously not quite normal.
Campos’s disappearance is but one odd element in the story. Another, of course, is the shifting timeline of the shooting. Last week, the sheriff’s office released a chronology indicating that Campos was shot six minutes before the gunman opened fire at the crowd, thus raising a host of questions about the timeliness of the police response. Within days, however, the timeline shifted again — this time indicating that Campos was shot around the same time the shooter began his attack:
Friday, however, Lombardo said that he now believes the security guard received his wounds close to the time the shooter started firing. Lombardo said Friday that the initial time he gave of 9:59 was when the security guard attempted to breach a door nearby the shooter’s . . . This comes after Mandalay Bay officials on Thursday disputed the timeline and whether six minutes actually passed between the first gunfire in the hallway and the start of the concert rampage. They said Paddock may have wounded the security guard within 40 seconds of firing into the crowd.
Finally, we still don’t know the shooter’s motive, and this is after police (and the media) have interviewed family members and friends and after the police have “searched Paddock’s homes, scoured his computers, assessed his finances and explored his travel history.” Finding a motive does more than merely help us make sense of a devastating night, it helps us shape policy and culture to prevent future attacks.
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- Discussion
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Shifting timelines, disappearing security guards, and still no motive. The Vegas attack is still so very strange: https://t.co/D9mTGcdUfB
— David French (@DavidAFrench) October 17, 2017
You don't have to be a tinfoil fan to wonder what on earth is going on here. https://t.co/tjbhIgAwAn
— John Schindler (@20committee) October 17, 2017
Mandalay Bay security guard Jesus Campos resurfaces on Ellen DeGeneres show https://t.co/JiaTYVAUSC
— Washington Post (@washingtonpost) October 18, 2017
I keep saying it has to do with who is in charge of the investigation. I don’t believe it’s local law enforcement; it’s the FBI. In the old days having the FBI in charge would ensure a complete, thorough, unbiased investigation. Unfortunately, today’s FBI is incompetent and corrupt. Naturally, some things about an investigation will be withheld from the public, particularly if a perp is still at large. So are they looking for more shooters as the conspiracy nuts claim? Or are they looking for evidence that Paddock was a jihadi — another conspiracy theory?
The problem with withholding information and obscuring timelines is that, absent a plausible, coherent explanation, all sorts of conspiracy theories, misinformation and disinformation are spread around and it all just mushrooms. We the public do have the right to know at least something true and correct about this act of terror, but we are getting nothing credible.
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