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No single motive for Las Vegas mass shooting: FBI concludes in report

Wednesday, 30 January 2019 8:33 AM [ Last Update: Wednesday, 30 January 2019 10:16 AM ]

An ambulance leaves the intersection of Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Ave. after a mass shooting at a country music festival nearby on October 2, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Getty Images)

The FBI has ended its investigation into a mass shooting in Las Vegas, the deadliest one in modern US history, concluding that the shooter, who killed 58 people by a sniper firing at an outdoor concert there in 2017, had no clear motive.

The gunman, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock from Mesquite, Nevada, was described as a gambler who had lived in a quiet community of senior citizens and played golf. He had no criminal history and drew little attention to himself.

In its report released on Tuesday, the FBI said that Paddock was like many other mass shooters, who are driven by a complex mix of issues, including but not limited to mental health to stress, and want to commit a suicide.

The agency said in the report that there was also no evidence showing any ideological or political beliefs that could have motivated Paddock, who wounded nearly 530 others in the attack too.

PressTV-59 dead, over 500 injured in Las Vegas mass shooting

A gunman has opened fire on a music concert in what is said to be the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.

“There was no single or clear motivating factor behind Paddock’s attack,” the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit said, echoing a report issued by Las Vegas police in August.

“Throughout his life, Paddock went to great lengths to keep his thoughts private, and that extended to his final thinking about this mass murder,” officials said in the report.

Influenced by the memory of his father, a well-known criminal, Paddock sought to gain a degree of infamy through a mass-casualty attack, the report noted.

The report also highlighted one aspect of the attack, describing it as Paddock’s desire to die by suicide as he suffered a decline in his physical and mental health and financial status.

“Paddock concluded that he would seek to control the ending of his life via a suicidal act,” according to the report.

"Paddock took multiple, calculated steps to insure that he could commit suicide at a time and in a manner of his choosing," the report concluded, adding he had used surveillance cameras and brought one handgun to the room where he used it to shoot himself.

In September, Amnesty International said that the gun violence situation in the United States had grown into a full blown "human rights crisis" amid inaction from the US government.

The issue has become all the more polarizing under President Donald Trump, a Republican whose presidential campaign was funded partially by the National Rifle Association (NRA).