The Watchdog Report

Something doesn’t add up. A few hours ago the Los Angeles Times ran the headline “Police change timeline, say Vegas gunman shot security guard 6 minutes before opening fire on concert.” Trump Watchdogs took notes that awful night as we listened to emergency dispatchers coordinate a response to the shooting. (We used a free app called 5-0 Radio.) So tonight we looked into what the Las Vegas police are saying. We compared the new police report with our notes from emergency radio. Based on our comparisons, it seems that the gunman was found hours later than the Sheriff says. Since the gunman had stopped his rampage long before, maybe the Sheriff figures nobody would notice the difference.

Update on 10-21-2017: There wasn’t just “the gunman.” Our notes from the emergency radio scanner only make sense if there were multiple shooters in Las Vegas. The theory of multiple shooters is backed by credible witness accounts… and if you watch & listen to smartphone recordings made during the shootings, you will probably agree. (Start with the taxi driver outside Mandalay Bay.)

Initially we figured that only Mandalay Bay owners/investors and local law enforcement had motives to cover up the truth… with the truth seeming to be, at first, serious inefficiency in emergency response. But that isn’t their claim. Now Las Vegas law enforcement has dismissed “rumors” of multiple shootings. The word “rumors” is insulting to people who know darn well what they experienced. The denial of the obvious tells us that something else is going on — and the apparent involvement of federal agencies in a Las Vegas shooting coverup is especially disturbing. 

While waaaaay right-wing posts link this all to Hillary Clinton and Obama, Trump Watchdogs wonder about Donald Trump. We don’t want to think about him, but it happens. Trump wants a spot on the Strip and also has lots of experience with casino security. Also, he wouldn’t want to admit that a terrorist attack by anyone other than a “lone gunman” happened in the US during his watch… But these musings aren’t why we took police scanner notes after the Las Vegas shootings. If this is a Trump scandal, it’s mere coincidence. 

Alright, now let’s return to our original report. Next it looks at how the official timeline changed significantly on October 9. 

Before a look at our notes, here are main points from the LA Times article:

• Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo revealed in a news conference today (October 9) that on October 1 the gunman Stephen Paddock shot security guard Jesus Campos through his hotel door six minutes before firing on the crowd at a music festival below.
• If the guard had been shot, why wasn’t the gunman’s location known to other emergency responders more quickly? Ideally if a hotel security guard is shot, the hotel security team knows immediately. Campos was investigating an alarm about an open door (probably a stairwell door, which apparently Paddock had adjusted for his plan). And we aren’t talking a single shot. Police say Paddock fired 200 rounds into the hallway.
• Officers searching the hotel didn’t know about the shot guard until they found him in a hallway.
• Originally police credited the security guard with stopping the assault 10 minutes after it started. Now police can’t explain why Paddock stopped his attack on the Route 91 Harvest concert crowd.
• A retired sheriff from LA County told reporters that hotel security evidently had a breakdown in communication. If police had known about the guard being shot, they would have rushed the hotel room before the shooting began.

Our notes support the idea that hotel security and Las Vegas police/fire did not have clear communication.

The Official Las Vegas Shooting Timeline

The Sheriff now provides this timeline of events at Mandalay Bay:

• 9:59 PM: Paddock shot Campos in the leg. Campos was checking an alert about an open door (not Paddock’s hotel room door).
• 10:05 PM: Paddock started his assault on the crowd.
• 10:15 PM: Paddock stopped shooting the crowd.
• 10:17 PM: Two officers arrived on floor 32 of Mandalay Bay and encountered Campos, who directed them to Paddock’s room. The officers waited for backup.
• 10:30 PM: By now another eight officers have arrived on the floor. They see the stairwell door that presumably Campos had initially investigated.
• 11:20 PM: Officers entered Paddock’s suite and found him already dead from a self-inflicted gunshot. (NBC says the suspect was reported as “down” at 11:27.)

You can compare police timelines at The Daily Mail.

Is the official timeline true? We think Paddock and Campos weren’t found until hours later. Although even if it’s true… what’s with the almost hour-long delay in the official response time?

Our Las Vegas Shooting Emergency Dispatch Notes

After learning about the Las Vegas shooting on Twitter, Trump Watchdogs tuned into the radio dispatch channel “Las Vegas Metropolitan Police – All Area Commands.” For the heck of it, we took notes.

Our notes start at 12:33 AM local time in Las Vegas. The police HAVE NOT REACHED THE 32ND FLOOR OF MANDALAY BAY. We believe Paddock was in Rooms 327 and 329.

12:33 AM Las Vegas Police say they have reports of victims needing transport from individual residences on Desert Rose, Duke Ellington and other places east of the Strip. Are checking on reports of people needing help at Bellagio.

A little later we paraphrased an exchange:

“Meet in front of Hooters to get to work on some of these calls coming in.”

“I have all the addresses. Call my cell.”

Soon the radio participants seem overwhelmed and confused. Many calls are coming in — MGM, Tropicana, Paris, Bellagio — and dispatchers aren’t sure which calls have been handled and which still need attention. Someone says, “Utilize those officers for help at the Tropicana and let me know who’s supervising. But call Dispatch to see if those calls are old.” They state that Tropicana is a priority.

At last we hear about Mandalay Bay. An emergency response team assembles at the valet. We hear about trailers and other areas being searched. Then:

“We aren’t finding patients. We don’t want officers just wandering the hotel.”

“32nd floor, room 327 is the room we were told. Two patients in there.”

We don’t hear anything about Mandalay Bay floor 32 for a little while. There’s talk about Excalibur, MGM and Tropicana. Then we hear about checking on victims in a storage room and the beach area of Mandalay Bay… Then more about MGM. Then:

“On way to Room 329 for a GSW.” (GSW = gunshot wound) It sounds as if the responder has NO IDEA they are going to one of the shooter’s two rooms.

Then at 1:02 AM: “We have an active shooter on the fourth floor of Mandalay Bay. Reports from SWAT.” The fourth floor? [Note: Two videos seen on Twitter seem to show fire from the fourth floor. Did Paddock move from the 32nd floor? Was another person shooting?]

A woman says, “Hold on. I’m going to suspend your operation. I don’t want the Mandalay Beach operation to get in your way.”

Soon a man says, “Dispatch is overrun with calls. We need to communicate by cell phone.”

“Text me your cell phone and I’ll relay it to Stevenson.”

This seems to be a problem. “I do need to speak with dispatch for details on the calls. I can’t send officers in blindly.”

The two people decide that “texting a picture of the call list” will suffice.

We hear more about MGM, an incident at Fat Burger, and sending private ambulances to victims located off the Strip. As for Mandalay Bay, there are reports of the first floor and convention center being checked out. Someone reports that someone in a first floor restroom is bleeding heavily. The dispatcher copies and adds that they’d lost track of that responder for awhile.

Shortly after someone enters Fat Burger, we hear that an officer is making his way up to the 32nd floor at Mandalay Bay. THIS IS AFTER 1:00 AM. “Let us know if you need more cars.”

Then the FBI joins the scene. “We just deployed a six person FBI team to Hooters. We don’t have radio contact with them but they’ll be an adjunct to Team 10.”

Next we hear from teams assembling at the Mandalay Bay valet. They are told to not leave the area until backup arrives.

Awhile passes. Someone says, “Chief, it’s taking us 20 minutes to check a floor. And there are 19 more floors. You want us to keep doing this?”

We don’t hear any reply.

There’s talk about various locations with victims, and which hospitals have rooms available. There’s a report that suspected gunshots at New York, New York were just sounds from a speaker. “So no active shooter at NY, NY.”

Next: “We have an alternative call plan.”

From then on we only hear about calls for paramedics or to move crowds to safety. For example, “We have large Rent-A-Car vans lining up to move people from the Michael Jackson nightclub at Mandalay Bay.”

What the heck happened at Mandalay Bay? Whatever happened, we think it’s not what the Sheriff is saying.

How Accurate Are Our Las Vegas Shooting Notes?

• Sometimes the notes are verbatim words from the dispatcher or an emergency responder. Sometimes the notes are paraphrased.
• The notes have gaps. Sometimes info didn’t sound critical to our unknown purpose, or we missed it while typing something else.
• There are minor errors. Sometimes we might have called a group “Team 10” instead of “Team 3,” or something like that…
• But when we noted the time, we noted the time carefully! And it doesn’t match what police are saying.

We thought the time had to have been wrong. Maybe the app was showing the wrong time? No. Next we checked Twitter for other events we had noted. Someone tweeted at 12:34 AM that 1200 people were “still locked down” in the Michael Jackson club. At 2:00 AM someone tweeted that buses were arriving. This lines up with our notes.

This calls for an investigation. Surely others have memories of dispatcher audio from that night/morning, or the audio is recorded somewhere. Honor the victims and don’t let this go.

Tags: Las Vegas, Police