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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Update on Las Vegas Massacre Investigation. Aired 8-9:15p ET
Aired October 04, 2017 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[20:00:39] ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: Good evening.
At the end of another day of big developments here in Las Vegas, we are expecting to learn more about the worst mass shooting in modern American history.
Another press conference by authorities is about to get underway. We're obviously going to bring that to you live. We learned a lot at the press conference last night. We hope to learn a lot more tonight as well.
Visited by President Trump today, of course.
Also tonight, there was a questioning by the FBI of the killer's girlfriend whose now back in the United States and more.
With all of that, the killer as always we are not naming remains a mystery. As we wait for press conference, I want to quickly talk to CNN's Martin Savidge about the latest in the investigation obviously, as soon as that press conference start, we'll go right to it.
Martin, a statement by the girlfriend of this killer through her attorney.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, so much has been anticipated as to what she might say, and tell the authorities and the public about what may have motivated all of this horrible tragedy. But she says in a statement she was just as shocked, just as horrified, just as surprised as everyone else.
She now joins a long list of people who say there were no red flags, there was no indication, no warning sign that he was going to do what he did. She also said that --
COOPER: Let's go to the press conference. I'm sorry, Martin.
SHERIFF JOSEPH LOMBARDO, LAS VEGAS METROPOLITAN POLICE: So thank you for being courteous with the mikes this time.
Well, good evening. Obviously, I'm Sheriff Joe Lombardo with Clark County. This has been -- this will be one of many press conferences we have provided in order to provide the public information that is occurring.
And then, so, the sequence of these events tonight, I will provide you some -- can we get some help out there? I will provide you the sequence of some updates of the investigation as we have moved forward since the last time we spoke with you. Any specifics or continuance of any global investigative leads that you need to be aware of, Special Agent Aaron Rouse will provide those, that information associated with that. OK?
And then subsequently I will return to the podium, assist with some Q&A and then Commissioner Sisolak is available if you have any questions of the commissioner. And then obviously, we have Senator Dean Heller who wished to address the audience also.
So, President Trump, I think he was in town today. Yes, he was in town. And the reason why I bring up President Trump is nothing to do in fact with President Trump but to do with the police department. There was some concern because of his visit that investigations associated with this case would be delayed or hindered.
And I'm here to assure you that none of that occurred. There was a separation of personnel associated with first responders of the Harvest Festival event that took the opportunity to meet with Mr. Trump and he had the opportunity to congratulate them for their heroic acts. The investigators directly related to this investigation, both my department and the FBI were not part of that. So, I want everybody assured, there was no hindrance in continuance of the investigation.
Return of property. There's a lot of questions going on with that. And I wish I could provide you answers with that. We will try to post on lvnpd.com when as soon as we advise victims when they can receive their personal property.
We are still evaluating the crime scene. Until that completes, the property phase will not occur. So, my best understanding of where we're at, we're looking at four to five days. So, I know that sounds troublesome but it's important that we dot the I's and cross the T's as evidence and possible prosecution in the future.
[20:05:03] Injuries. Injury numbers that we're using today, 489. Of that 489, 317 have been discharged from the hospital. So, the question is, Sheriff, you provided several different numbers associated with that, all the way up to 527. Now, you got to imagine, we're dispersed across several hospitals, we're relying on the internal communications of the hospital to provide us with accurate numbers. So, that's ever changing.
And additionally, hospitals receive patients outside of this event. So, quite often -- hopefully not quite often, but often, some of those patients were double counted or they were misconstrued as event injuries versus other injuries such as or accidents. So, today, I'm comfortable saying that the injured number is 489.
Deaths still remain at 59. I had told you 59 before plus one, being the suspect. That changed. Today, it's 58 plus one, the suspect, 59. And it's the same reason that occurred before as I explained.
So, hopefully, you understand that. Nobody wants that number to go up and by the grace of God, it went down. So, that's a good night. So, today, I will provide you updates on the investigation of the mass
shooting Sunday night, Route 91. More than 100 investigators have spent the last 72 hours combing through the live of 64-year-old Stephen Paddock to produce a profile of someone I will call disturbed and dangerous.
What we know is Stephen Paddock is a man who spent decades acquiring weapons and ammo, and living a secret life, much of which will never be fully understood. He meticulously planned on the worst domestic attack in United States history.
As many of you already reported, Paddock rented a room at the Ogden Hotel in downtown Las Vegas. This has been confirmed, OK? Reasons that ran through Paddock's mind is unknown, but it is directly during the same time as Life is Beautiful. We have received -- recovered evidence from that location. We don't know if it is evidence but we've recovered items and video evidence.
And I don't -- you know what? I'm using the wrong term. Evidence is not the term. We have recovered video from there to review Mr. Paddock's actions while he was there.
Now, it's important for you to understand this was not -- the rooms were not rented by the Ogden. It was done through Airbnb by a private owner unknown to the Ogden. So, we have very great cooperation from the owners of Life is Beautiful and the Ogden, and they're in full cooperation.
OK. While we have already spoken to many people who had contact with Stephen Paddock at hotels and places he frequented, we still have more interviews to conduct. Since, Monday there have been many questions for us to release a time line and today we have one. I want to point out the information previously reported on the time of the first shot was based on a CAD report, computer aided dispatch. That's what we do for calls for service.
So, that report is dependent upon a particular person calling in on that time stamp. What we've done through the review of body worn cameras, we were able to pull it back to, previously from 10:08 to 10:05.
So, Carlos?
So, I'm going to give you the chance to review that, take photographs of it and I'll walk you through each time line.
So, at 10:05 the first shots fired by the suspect. This was seen scene on closed circuit television from the concert video. Ten- twelve, first two officers arrived on the 31st floor and announced that gun fire is coming directly above them. Ten-fifteen, last shots were fired from the suspect through body worn camera. So, if you're looking at the math, 10 minutes.
Ten-seventeen, the first two officers arrive on the 32nd floor. Ten- eighteen, security officer tells the LVMPD officers he was shot and gives the exact location of the suspect's room. Now, you notice a minute, delta there before they broadcasted it.
Obviously, they were in a conversation with the security guard immediately upon them exiting the elevators. Between 10:26 and 10:30, eight additional officers arrived on the 32nd floor and begin to move systematically down the hallway, clearing each room and looking for any injured people.
[20:10:08] This -- they move this way because they no longer hear the gun fire of the active shooter situation.
Ten-fifty-five, eight officers arrived at the stairwell at the opposite end of the hallway nearest the suspect's room. So, when I say nearest to suspect's room, you can imagine the doorway of the hotel room, this stairwell, and this door access is approximately two to three feet away. Eleven-twenty, the first breach was set off and officers entered the suspect's room. They observed the suspect down on the ground and also saw a second door that could not be accessed from their position.
So, it's a suite. And we have -- you have a main area of the suite, which is the living room, kitchen dining area and on opposite ends of that is two bedrooms.
I'm sorry. Where did I leave off? Somebody yell it out.
OK. So, if you do the math on that, all the way up to 11:20 in 10:05, we're looking at 75 minutes.
So, young lady in the front with the red phone, you mentioned 72 minutes. Now, you see where those minutes come from, OK?
At 11:27, a second breach was set off allowing officers to access the second room and no one else was located within the hotel room.
OK. These are following extenuating circumstances as to why it may appear that there was delay or undue delay in reaching the suspects. OK. The officers in the first strike team reached the 32nd floor within 12 minutes which is phenomenal of the first shot being fired. When the officers arrived and confirmed the location of the suspect's room, the gun fire had stopped.
In accordance with their training, the officers retrieved a master key card from the injured security guard, and began to systematically clear each hotel room. So, imagine the elevator bank in the center, 150 feet down on a triplex hotel was the suspect's room. So, there's several rooms along the way because no firing was occurring, they could not hear additional firing, they believed it was important to evacuate in case the suspect was barricaded.
While the first strike team did this, the second team made up of two K9 personnel, a SWAT officer and patrol officers navigated the numerous stairs wearing heavy tactical gear, carrying a large bag with tactical equipment and holding rifles in order to have a closer position to the suspect's room. And that is within that stairwell and that doorway adjacent to the room I described previously. They attempted to secure the front doorway of the suspect's room. But
as they entered into the hallway, they could see the room service cart and readily apparent on the room service cart were cameras.
So, they pulled back and waited for the approach of a full SWAT team. Keep in mind, this delay was not undue. It was purposeful and no shots were being heard by the suspect at this point.
Eventually, a plan was formulated, entry was made, suspect was seen laying on the ground, they encountered a closed bedroom door which was locked and they breached that door and found no other suspect.
Another investigative issue was cameras. Questions were presented about cameras and whether they were recording. We determined none of the cameras were recording.
There were two cameras on the room service cart out in the hallway, there was one on the peephole of the front door and additionally there was a baby monitor camera placed in the general family area of the hotel room. None of them were being recorded.
One thing I left out was the initial approach and they looked out in the hallway when they observed the cameras on the room service cart, it was obviously, there were several rounds discharged through the door and through the blasts of the bullets through the door, you could actually see a weapon through those openings in the door but no suspect was seen. Now, those rounds were the strafing rounds that he put through the door in order to shoot at the security guard.
OK. The other thing I wanted to update you on is the search warrant of the suspect's vehicle located at the Mandalay Bay.
[20:15:01] I had presented that there was ammonium nitrate recovered but there were several cases within the car that had not been search yet at the last briefing I provided with you.
So, within those cases, there was 10 one-pound containers of Tannerite, two 20-pound containers of Tannerite, and approximately 1,600 rounds of ammunition.
So, Carlos, can you put up the numbers?
So, tip line. This is an ongoing investigation. We can never not have enough information because we are continuing to run down leads and it's important for us to get all of the information that we can on Mr. Paddock, because right now we're trying to prove his intent or understand his intent and the history associated with this and whether or not he has any accomplices.
So, we asked people to still call in to 311. If you're out of state, 702-828-311. And then the FBI 1-800-CALL FBI. And that is investigative and also for electronic media. If you're able to call them, they provide you the ability to download that online into their system.
So, at this point, I will provide you special agent in charge, Aaron Rouse, and he will walk you through some of the investigative steps we have accomplished jointly and where we're at in that total investigation.
Subsequent to that, I will come back to the podium for any Q&A and then we will have Commissioner Sisolak and Senator Dean Hiller make comments.
Thank you.
AARON ROUSE, FBI SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, LAS VEGAS: Thank you, Sheriff.
My name is Aaron Rouse. I'm the special agent in charge for the Las Vegas division of the FBI.
Before I begin I just want to comment that on behalf of all of the FBI, specifically the Las Vegas division, our sympathy goes out to all of the families affected by this tragedy. This is our community. It's our community too. We live here. And we will get through this together.
The FBI has had a great partnership, continues to have a great partnership with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, as well as our other state and local officials. To say that this investigation will take a while is not surprising. So, there's a lot of information that's going to change over time as we determine more facts.
But this is what I can tell you. Our resolve is firm. We will get to the bottom of this, no matter how long it takes.
The FBI has deployed over 100 personnel from across the nation to assist the Las Vegas division in this investigation. This includes victim witness assistants, EAP counselors, evidence technicians and technical assets, not to mention additional agents to help cover leads.
The information that the public provides us is going to help us solve this. But we must focus on facts. We cannot give in to conjecture and we cannot respond to every little Twitter feed that may indicate a theory. We need to focus on the facts. You need us to be right. You expect us to be right and we want to be right.
There's going to be questions, I'm sure you're going to have questions, about some of people that we've been talking to, maybe people outside of the United States.
The fundamental trust of the American people and the FBI is based upon our discretion and how good would that discretion be if we were to provide information that they provided to us in confidence. This is about informing on an investigation, this is about resolving an investigation. So specifics regarding any individual contact cannot be answered. You need us, you trust us and the way we have that trust is by using good discretion about what we share.
Additionally, we have multiple leads all across the United States and all across the world. To our legal attaches determining the whereabouts and travel patterns of all the people involved in this investigation, and that was gross. A lot of the leads will go absolutely nowhere but we have to follow them. That's going to take some time. Patience is going to be required of all of us.
I know that we have the patience of the police department because we have a great partnership and we're all interested in the same thing, resolving this issue fairly and factually.
With that, I'll turn it back over to Sheriff Lombardo.
LOMBARDO: OK. Happy to answer questions and please provide decorum.
[20:20:00] REPORTER: Sheriff --
LOMBARDO: Yes, sir?
REPORTER: -- we know you had the opportunity and the FBI to speak with Marilou Danley. We know that you had access to his computers, his cell phones and so forth. While you're not yet able to tell us specifically what you've found, let me ask you generally.
LOMBARDO: OK.
REPORTER: Through all of the information that you've so far arrived at, is there anything that gives you a sense as to what was going on with this man and what the motive might be? Without saying what it is, are you seeing anything that gives you a direction or any kind of an answer to that question?
LOMBARDO: Globally, no. I'm sorry to report, no, me personally. But I'm not privy to the subsequent interviews that were conducted today. The FBI is not ready to disclose, for public consumption, what occurred in those interviews as of yet. Sorry for that answer.
Yes, sir?
REPORTER: Sheriff, the family said through an attorney that during the course of her time with the suspect that she never saw her heard anything that suggested that he would carry out an act like this. You also said that you were looking for other people associated with leads, information specifically that there's a woman that you're looking for to talk to that may have been associated with the suspect. Is that true?
You also said in your comments --
LOMBARDO: Are you going to give me a chance to answer? Can you start from the beginning?
REPORTER: Sorry.
LOMBARDO: OK.
REPORTER: Question about the comments to her lawyer that she had no idea what was going on. LOMBARDO: Well, I think any person put in her situation would
probably answer the same way. But like I said, we're not privy to the investigative leads that were obtained today. Mr. Rouse could probably give you better clarification to that. I haven't been briefed by the FBI on that interview as of yet.
What was the other question?
REPORTER: You said you're still trying to figure out whether he had any accomplices.
LOMBARDO: Right. Yes, we're obviously going through that. It's troublesome that this individual was able to move this amount of gear into a hotel room unassisted. It's troublesome for the amount of stuff he had at both residences unassisted.
So, there are people that know this individual. There are people that can help us understand this individual. Because you know, interestingly enough, I read periodical today, earlier today, and it was from an FBI profiler that didn't understand this individual. Usually there's a telltale sign associated with these types of actions, you know, reclusive -- a plethora of things associated with this mind-set and we have not found that yet.
So, what could be more beneficial than to find people that are associated with them either by friendship or accomplice, and for us to determine that.
REPORTER: Thank you.
LOMBARDO: Yes, sir.
REPORTER: Two questions, Sheriff. First, you mentioned in your comments he had a secret life. What do you mean by that?
LOMBARDO: Well, most of us -- not most of us. I don't. I don't live through social media, OK? There's a lot of us that live through social media in today's world. There's a lot of people that are interactive in the public. There's a lot of people that have work mates.
This individual is retired. We found out that he has some real estate investments. Relationship-wise, it's very hard to determine what has occurred in his life in the last decade or so.
We do know that he has an ex-wife. She didn't lead us to any knowledge. We know -- everybody knows we talked to his brother. No knowledge was obtained.
So, anything that would indicate this individual's trigger point and that would cause him to do such harm, we haven't understood it yet. And I think it's important to get there, and you have to be patient with us, because this premeditation of this room, this is well thought out. So, don't you think the concealment of his history or his life was well-thought out. And it's incumbent upon us as professionals to figure that out. REPORTER: And besides what he did, that horrific act, are there any
other signs of a mental breakdown?
LOMBARDO: I'm not aware. I personally have not been briefed on some of his personal background. I'm leaving that to the experts. And I haven't been updated on that yet.
So, it's going to be frustrating for you obviously. But you got to remember, and I've said it a hundred times. This is an investigation and we can't be delayed by providing information that would delay our information or cause an individual to go underground.
You know all that. Everybody sitting before me knows that. And I just need you to understand it, OK?
[20:25:02] It's important for you to convey to the public we're doing everything that we are -- possibly can do to bring this to fruition. And I think we're doing that and I ask you for your patience.
REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE) during the course of your investigation, you discovered that perhaps Paddock might have been targeting another concert a week before, the concert --
LOMBARDO: Yes, I mentioned that he obtained a room at the Ogden, which is located in downtown at the same time that "Life is Beautiful" was being conducted. Was he doing pre-surveillance? We don't know yet, OK? This is all conjecture and it's why it is important for us to have boots on the ground getting the answers.
REPORTER: On the stairwell --
LOMBARDO: Yes?
REPORTER: There's information out there that the door to the stairwell, the 32nd floor was barricaded and possibly welded shut. Can you confirm whether that door was welded shut?
LOMBARDO: It was not welded shut but it was secured.
REPORTER: Sheriff, have you determined whether he had visitors in his room while he was at the hotel?
LOMBARDO: No, not at -- as of yet, no.
REPORTER: Sorry, no, not --
LOMBARDO: As of yet no. We haven't been able to determine if there was anybody else in the room beside him.
REPORTER: Sheriff, that Tannerite in the car, does that lead you to believe that he might have been planning a bigger attack?
LOMBARDO: Speculation. I'll leave you for your own free will on that speculation. But you know, it remains in the car for some reason.
Ricardo? REPORTER: Is there an estimate of how many rounds he fired? And is
there an estimate of how many rounds he didn't fire found in the room?
LOMBARDO: No, just -- you know what, I'll give you my personal preview. That will come out in the public space. No, the rounds haven't been counted yet. There's a lot of evidentiary system taking place prior to the recovery of the rounds. But there was well in excess of thousands of rounds still in the room.
REPORTER: Sheriff, these are leaked photos. There was a yellow, what appeared to be a yellow note. Can you tell us anything about that?
LOMBARDO: No, I don't. I can't recall.
REPORTER: A suicide note or anything?
LOMBARDO: No, no, it was not a suicide note. I'm comfortable in saying that.
REPORTER: Sheriff, where is Marilou Danley now and is she still a person of interest?
LOMBARDO: OK, everything to do with Marilou Danley, I will have Special Agent Rouse address that. OK? If you have questions outside of that, we can circle back on that.
Stephanie?
REPORTER: My question is for Special Agent Rouse about Marilou Danley.
LOMBARDO: OK, we'll circle back on that.
You guys want to know how I know her name? She was eating lunch next to me today and introduced herself. She's from Australia.
(LAUGHTER)
REPORTER: Sheriff, do you know what caused him to stop shooting?
LOMBARDO: Very good question. No, I do not know. I don't know if -- this is my assumption, only my assumption and nobody has been able to dispel my assumption as of today.
I believe because of his countermeasures placed in the peephole and in the hallway, he observed, the security guard and he was in fear that he was about to be breached. So, he was doing everything possible to figure out how he could escape at that point. His concern was personnel's concern versus what was occurring down below him.
REPORTER: Can you tell us anything about what time he shot himself and can you tell us --
LOMBARDO: You know, I don't have the answer to that question. That question has been presented and we haven't been able, through the internal investigation of that, to pinpoint exactly if it was heard when he shot himself or did it occur in close proximity to entry. Because as you imagine, when they breached the door they used explosive devices. Did it occur in close proximity to the explosive devices and we lost it in the audible or did it occur when we were trying to set up or team in the hallway.
REPORTER: Do you know when the security guard was separated from the other officers?
LOMBARDO: He was -- he was -- it was my understanding before I had said he had gotten separated. That was inaccurate. What had had happened was he was conducting an investigation based on customers calling in and he was personally attempting to locate what was occurring. He happened upon that doorway because it was ajar, which keyed his interest. But our officers were in close proximity.
So, as you can imagine, by the time line there, as soon as they came out of the doorway of the elevator, he was there. So, it happened in a matter of seconds.
(CROSSTALK)
LOMBARDO: Hold on, let me finish her.
REPORTER: On the note, can you tell us about note, a note for him, was there a content --
LOMBARDO: What note, the yellow paper?
REPORTER: Yes.
LOMBARDO: I don't know, I don't know. I haven't -- I did a cursory review of the room but I haven't been provided that information. But I know it was not a suicide note.
Yes, sir?
REPORTER: If you believe he saw the security guard approaching, that might have caused him to stop shooting. If he hadn't have seen the security guard approaching, do you believe the shooting would have continued?
SHERIFF JOSEPH LOMBARDO, LAS VEGAS METROPOLITAN POLICE: No. And I'm comfortable in saying no. And here is why because the same action the security guard would have heard with our patrol officer. That was approaching up there.
We had knowledge he was between 31 and 32, remember when you asked before we said 29 and 32, and then subsequently through that time it got called down to 31, 32, a knowledgeable customer, prior military said it was occurring directly above him, which subsequently the officers were doing their own checks, he was not aware of what that customer had said and they were conducting he was trying to pinpoint. So our officer had learned, because they had a security guard attached to them that they had recent information to the individual was on 32.
OK, so they would have encountered him shortly in that timeline, maybe 60 seconds. And I would assume the same thing would have occurred.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff we question about when he stopped firing and why.
(OFF-MIC)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Based on the assessment of the weapons he was there and using and access to, are any of these weapons jammed or inoperable or could he had continued firing without any problem if he had not possibly in the cameras --
LOMBARDO: He could have continued firing. Some of them were jammed but he could have continued firing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Some were jammed?
LOMBARDO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many?
LOMBARDO: I don't know the number by some. But he had plenty of fire power available.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any idea --
LOMBARDO: If you recall there were 23 weapons recovered, so.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And other who didn't reached you --
LOMBARDO: Yes. Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One last question on the weapons (INAUDIBLE). This guy had a 300 ground and about 500, 800 yards -- how many of these weapons he was using firing in with advance optics on (INAUDIBLE) how many scopes or anything else like that?
LOMBARDO: Just from my visual preview of the crime scene I saw at least three scopes. Most of them didn't have scopes.
(OFF-MIC)
LOMBARDO: No from what I know of firearms pretty behind (ph) in scopes not marksmanship scopes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, was the security officers armed. And can you talk about his bravery.
LOMBARDO: I don't know if he was armed. I don't know the security profile at the Mandalay Bay. I know quite often some, security officers armed some aren't, some supervisor is not regular -- I don't know the profile at the Mandalay Bay personally. So I don't know if he was armed.
But his bravery was amazing because he remained with our officers providing them the key pass to access the door and actually continued to help them clear rooms until our officer demanded that he go seek medical attention.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: While injured?
LOMBARDO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, can you just --
LOMBARDO: Let him ask questions.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The activities before the shooting that we've heard someone say gambling, do you know?
LOMBARDO: Yes, we are aware he was gambling.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For hours?
LOMBARDO: I don't know the timeline but we are aware he was gambling.
(OFF-MIC)
LOMBARDO: So reference, let me provide some clarification because I answer one of the other questions on accomplice. We did see he was gambling but we didn't see another individual that appeared to be with him.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What time was that?
LOMBARDO: I don't recall ma'am.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, (INAUDIBLE) CBS News that (INAUDIBLE) weapons in October 2016, he bought some 33 riffle, are you looking into the possibility that there may have been some kind of a mentally issue, something that happened in October of 2016 that compelled him to purchase those weapons?
LOMBARDO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are?
LOMBARDO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What have you uncovered?
LOMBARDO: I haven't -- I don't have the information. I wish I could provide you. I don't have it, but we are looking. We're looking on that too, sir.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You suggested that after he saw the security guard that his concern became himself, did you see any evidence that he planned to survive this or try to escape?
LOMBARDO: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's that?
LOMBARDO: I can't tell you. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, just to clarify, the security guards and the officers came up to positively identified his location and --
LOMBARDO: I'm sorry start over.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The security guard or your officers arriving that positively identified the location first?
LOMBARDO: It was the security guard. The officers had knowledge that it was occurring on the 32nd floor. They assumed that it was at the end of the hallway because the person that has called said it was apparently directly above him. So having this assumption, in fact so many other rooms but the security guard had confirmed it prior to their arrival.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And can you say more detail about the magnitude of the gunfire that he encountered when he got when he was spotted?
LOMBARDO: Yes, my personal observation, well over 200 rounds straight to hallway.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, --
[20:35:04] LOMBARDO: So it's amazing that that security guard didn't sustain additional injury.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, you commented that you believe he had a plan --
(OFF-MIC)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What have you determined that could have given you proof he had to escape --
(OFF-MIC)
LOMBARDO: That's just a different way of asking the same question. I can't answer that for you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sheriff, did the officers fire back at all?
LOMBARDO: No. No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sheriff, you mentioned accomplices. We've talked previously about Marilou Danley as a person of interest. Are there any other person of interest in this investigation?
LOMBARDO: Well, is there any other? No. Concrete? No. We're looking at it this way, Ken, is there another one? No. And we're determined to find out if there was. I mean, it's important not to close this case until we run down everything.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should we ask the terrorist question --
LOMBARDO: Because look at this, I mean, you look at the weapon obtaining the different amounts of tannerite available, do you think this was all accomplished on his own, self value, face value? You got to make the assumption, he had to have some help at some point, and we want to ensure that's being answer. Maybe he's a super guy, maybe he is super hero -- not a hero, super -- you know, I won't use the word. Maybe he's super -- that was working out this out on his own but it will be hard for me to believe that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And to that do we need to ask --
LOMBARDO: And here is the reason why, put one and one together, two and two together, another residence in Reno with firearms, OK, electronics and everything else associated with larger amounts of ammo, a place in mesquite, we know he had a girlfriend. Do you think this is all self-facing individual without talking to somebody, it was sequestered amongst himself. I mean, come on focus folks, this types of investigations have been occurring in the last few years and we have to evaluate that. So hold off, I'm done, OK.
What I want you to do is give Aaron Rouse an opportunity to talk about Marilou. He may not have anything for you, OK, but I think it's fair for you to ask him and then I would like to get to the Senator Heller and Commissioner Sisolak.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The car was --
(OFF-MIC)
LOMBARDO: I'm sorry?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was the car planted for him to --
LOMBARDO: Don't ask me to make assumptions, please.
AARON ROUSE, FBI SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, LAS VEGAS: Thank you.
Ken (ph)?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You were asking, where is Marilou Danley now and is she still a person of interest in this investigation?
ROUSE: As I mentioned in my comments, you know, people rely on us for our discretion. If someone is assisting us in an investigation, if they're being cooperative, that's between us and them. Giving away the location of a citizen or somebody that is cooperating with us, is not in our best interest, it's not in that person's best interest, and so there's a matter of their business, so I'm not going to comment on that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She's not in federal custody?
ROUSE: We have no one in custody.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Special Agent Rouse. If I can ask the same question, without saying anything specific, after seeing his computers and speaking to Marilou, do you have any direction, any sense as to what may have been a motivate? Any sense, any evidence of anything? ROUSE: So, as I mentioned to my earlier remarks, we like to deal with facts. So there is a great and everyone can have a theory but I need to deal with facts. The Sheriff needs to deal with facts. We're reliant on that to do our jobs. So that's what we're going to focus on. There are number of working theories out there and we're going to continue use those but we're not going to publicize them because that's not fair to anyone. We do not want to tint anyone unfairly. We want to make sure that what we have is accurate and you want us to be accurate. That's what you expect of us.
(OFF-MIC)
ROUSE: We have found no evidence to this point to indicate terrorism. But this is an ongoing investigation. We're going to continue to look at all avenues. We're not closing down any doors. The best way to do an investigation, the sheriff will tell you this, I'll tell you this, is that you don't go in with assumptions, he's not going to make assumptions as he just said, I'm not going to make assumptions.
We're going in there following the facts. The facts will always lead you to your conclusion. But we hope very much so to be able to provide concrete information to the public about why this happened, because that's what's on everyone's mind. Because to understand the why helps you deal with the tragedy that we've all faced and we've all faced it. So, believe me we want to know why.
[20:40:12] ROUSE: OK, I want to take this time to give the commissioner an opportunity to say a few words.
STEVE SISOLAK, CLARK COUNTRY COMMISSIONER: Thank you. I'm going to say some things that the Sheriff didn't say. When you see these men and women in uniforms, and the men and women that don't wear uniforms, a lot maybe (INAUDIBLE) I've notice, you got to tell them thank you, I mean what -- I've dealt with these folks, I've been working with them for the last three days. They are working on zero sleep. I beg of you to show some patience.
I'm hearing the same question ask, three, four, five times in different ways, speculation coming out at this group. These gentlemen deal exclusively in facts. They're not speculating, there's no conjecture here. They're not dealing with theories, they're dealing with facts. Their primary purpose and their goal is to conclude this investigation in a professional and accurate manner and I'm totally confident that they're going to do that.
They are protecting the citizens of Clark County and the tourists that are here. They have made the city safe again. It is a safe place to come. We encourage that but I implore you please, please slow some patience and understand that they're not going to deal with conjecture and theories that are coming up on social media. Thank you very much.
SENATOR DEAN HELLER (R), NEVADA: My words and comments are similar to what the commissioner just said in the important of patience. This horrific incident is less than 72 hours old. And the reason that I come to these briefings and this press conference is to listen to the sheriff and learn bit by bit what happened just a little while ago. What I want to express is my gratitude to the sheriff, to the FBI, to the ATF and for everybody that is keeping us up to date to what is going on, briefing my office and myself. And I also want to express how grateful I am that the President of the United States came in today to expressed his sincere concerned for this community and understanding what this means.
I had a rare occasion to be at 30,000 feet with a couple of hours of face time with this particular President and we talked specifically about the heroes, the individuals, the deputies, the first responders and all that and what they were able to achieve in a very short period of time.
In my cellphone here I have numerous pictures of survivors from UMC and I express and shared those pictures with the President of the United States so that he could see some of the damages on what had occurred.
One in particular was a deputy, there was on the second day, I know we've heard the story, second day on the job. He was there. His father was actually at the event as a spectator when the shooting occurred, got hit in the arm and went to his chest. His name is Brady Cook (ph). And I shared the story with the President. President went up to the fifth floor of the UMC and had an opportunity to talk to this young mean and express his sincere gratitude for his strengths.
I also showed him a picture of a cellphone that had an apple phone that had a bullet through it. It was a therapist over at UMC. And that bullet went through her phone and hit her hand. She just had tissue damage, she fixed it herself. Went back to UMC and spent hours helping those that had come into the hospital. These stories were important for me to share with the President of the United States as he was coming into this valley and understanding the depth of the issue we had on hand.
But it wasn't just that I also lobbied him on a couple of issues, one has to do with terrorist. Now, I didn't lobby the President because it was important to me, I asked the governor what should I talk to him about. I asked the mayor, what do you want me to talk to the President about? I ask the sheriff, what do you want me to talk to the President about? And it had to do with these urban tourism funds that come out of homeland security, and how important it is that Las Vegas, the strip has the funding necessary to keep, not only citizens safe, but also those that are visiting this city.
It's not enough that we have 2.1 million people that live in this valley but we have 42 million people that come in every year to visit. And I want to make sure the Las Vegas has the funding, tourism funding necessary to keep us safe, to buy the equipment that they need to be able to monitor and be able to follow up on the issues that they're faced with on a day-to-day basis.
So my gratitude continues from everybody around the country. About 15 seconds ago I was sitting right behind. A cab driver that I used in New York City just sent me a taxi. We became friends on a ride but his message to a senator, myself, my family and all my drivers wanted to express our condolences of those touched by the recent weekend shooters. All our best. The cab driver from New York concerned about Las Vegas valley.
[20:45:16] So I am grateful for all my colleagues back in Washington, D.C. grateful for the sheriff, the FBI, the ATF, all the work that's being done, the hearing has begun, but it's been less than 72 hours, way one to go. Thank you very much for being here today.
LOMBARDO: All right, that will conclude today's press conference. So, as a matter of moving forward I can't give you a definitive time for tomorrow. I anticipate to these press conferences will stay at a maximum once a day because leads are changing that fast for us to address this group.
The one thing I wanted to talk to each and every of you in this room, thank you. Thank you very much. You have been very professional, you have not been overwhelming and I appreciate your candor and your ability to express exactly what occurred in the Las Vegas valley. So, thank you and hopefully you have a great night. Thank you.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: New details tonight from Las Vegas, authorities, you just heard Sheriff Joe Lombardo's working assumption. He said, the gunman had to have some help at some point to do what he did.
Also, a new timeline, first shots fired 10:05 local time the first breach of his room an hour and 15 minutes later, more than 2000 shots fired into the hotel hallway.
Again, I'm here with Art Roderick, former Assistant Director of the U.S. Marshals Service, and the team of CNN Correspondents and law enforcement experts, Martin Savidge is with us as well.
Art, just in terms of what you heard, and a lot of new information in that, not just the timeline but the idea perhaps that this guy was thinking about trying to -- having an escape plan.
ART RODERICK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, that's the first time we heard this that he thought he might actually get out there. Now, what also is concerning is what he had in his vehicle. He had explosives in his vehicle. It could have been set off at any given point. So this is getting -- this plan of escape opens us up a lot wider. And, you know, the explosives in the vehicle are very concerning to everyone.
COOPER: Also by the way, we have Phil Mudd is with us, Martin Savidge, David Simon, Juliette Kayyem as well.
Martin, it's interesting seeing that timeline, you really get more and more of a sense, that you heard for that long for them to breach the door. But that sort of -- the key point is that, the shooting only went on for 10 minutes.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right.
COOPER: The first place were able to get up to that floor and they found a security guard who had been shot, and it seems like from the timeline, that it was the shooting of that security guard, the arrival of that security guard from the hotel that redirected his attention toward the possibility that his room was going to be breached and stopped him from firing any more out the window.
SAVIDGE: It did. It broke the scenario as it were. And the fact that law enforcement could ascertain from when the first shot was fired to actually make again to the floor and began to intervene in 10 minutes, when you look the way, incredible.
COOPER: It's incredible.
SAVIDGE: It is incredible.
COOPER: When you hear -- and you're not here on the scene, but I mean, when you look, you know, from -- I mean, it's blocks away, it's too small windows on the 32nd floor, I assume some officers saw a muzzle flashing and that's the way they figured it out. But the fact that was only that amount of time I actually think it's remarkable.
SAVIDGE: It's dark. It's also -- there's tens of thousands of people that are about. And you don't get a too many scenario up to this point where a sniper, high ground shooting down.
COOPER: Right.
SAVIDGE: As part of the terror attack --
COOPER: Texas watchtower, I think --
SAVIDGE: Texas tower, yes.
COOPER: And that was -- I mean --
SAVIDGE: -- 60 second, but in 10 minutes they figured it out.
COOPER: Yes, Phil Mudd to you, what stood out from this press conference?
PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: Well, if you look at the characteristics that you want to understand to put this together, let me put three on the table one side exploitation. Going to the house, for example, going to the hotel room, we have a lot of information about that. How they breach the location, how many weapons were found? How many rounds -- the two basics elements that we want to understand that determine motive would be, what kind of digital information do we have, and how do we exploit it, phones and things like laptop, that's typically in the FBI inbox, zero. We got nothing on that today, as you'd expect 72 hours into that.
The second thing would be people, interviews. This was fascinating, Anderson, there was a suggestion in there by both the sheriff and the FBI that some of those interviews are cooperative, that is people are providing information. Maybe including the woman who was the girlfriend of the shooter, mentioned, she's not in custody and talked about not wanting to disclose her location because one would not want to talk about someone who's cooperating.
That to me is critically important. If you have people, whether it's a neighbor, whether it's somebody at a gun range, whether it's the girlfriend who can help get insight of an individual that they've known for years, that could cut to chase in terms of motivates. So those two areas, digital information and interviews were really blank spaces and there is a suggestion on that list one interviews that we're learning something.
[20:50:16] COOPER: And, Juliette, I mean, the sheriff talked about kind of a secret life that this person had. I don't know if that's based on particular information, to Phil's point that they have learned. But also that he had rented out a room, I guess it was the week before, at a prior music festival.
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: That's right. So this is just consistent with there was a lot of planning. Perhaps he even had a different target in mind at one stage but preferred having the elevated view over the concert. When you look at this press conference, I think there was sort of clear tension or at least sort of the sheriff wanting to sort of give more information, the FBI essentially standing up there saying, only the facts, only the facts.
But something the sheriff said that we've been talking about the last two days, he finds it inconceivable that something like this could have been planned for so long and that he was unassisted. Those are his exact words. Do you think heck do this unassisted? And so that does make me think that these interviews are leading to questions about if others knew, conspirators, with the girlfriend, she may be cooperating now, she may not be cooperating later. She may constructively have knowledge that something was happening but not until she sort of pierces her own memory, realized that was what in fact was being planned. So these investigations will take a long time. But definitely the sheriff has a theory of the case, and so this investigation is going to move forward.
COOPER: Yes, Phil Mudd, I mean, to you the idea of the explosive left in the vehicle, and based on what the sheriff said does it seem to you that there may be some idea in this person's mind that they had some sort of exit strategy? Or idea of moving elsewhere?
MUDD: There's a couple characteristics of the explosives that I find curious. We've heard about two explosive machine (ph), one is ammonium nitrate that could potential be used with other materials for a back bomb, they did he acquire that staff and never use it? Was there a trigger that let me not to pursue building a bomb? There's a reference to tannerite. Art, probably knows more about that than I do but that can be cinematic, dramatic. That as you put a small amount of that in a place, and you pop it with a rifle and you get a large explosive effect.
Did he want to use that over time in some location to create a diversion? The answers about those explosives I think will help us on a couple of questions, Anderson. One is what the sheriff was talking about, did he want to escape? Did he ever have other locations he was thinking about? And two is, why did he acquire this materiel and not use it? Was there a trigger that led him to choose that target and that location before he could fully develop a plot?
COOPER: Art, to you, I mean, the explosive --
RODERICK: That to me is the biggest question here. I know, there's a lot of questions of this particular case, about those explosives, that's the scary part in there.
What was he planning to do with those? I mean, you just don't acquire them, leave them in your vehicle, and not have a plan for them. The tannerite could set up the Ammonium nitrate. So was he using that as a vehicle-borne explosive device?
COOPER: The other thing that I got to say, it's terrifying, I keep coming back to the intervention, the early intervention by the first responders. The amount of -- not only -- we don't know how many shell casings actually will be found. They haven't accounted for that. But the amount of munitions that he still had available to him. And had he chosen to continue firing, I mean the death toll, it's incalculable.
SAVIDGE: It would have been. And, you know, another thing that needs to be brought up, and we've talked about this, the bump stock that he's using, this kind of odd mechanism that allowed his weapon to fire like an automatic. That's not easy to use. It's a very difficult kind of technique to master, which means he would have had to have practiced a lot. And the question mark is, where was he doing it? And was anybody assisting him with that?
COOPER: You made the point earlier in the two about the way he was using -- the way the gun was set up.
MUDD: Right, it was. It was set up for tactical purposes. But those weapons are not made to fire in automatic status. So that bump stock that he had would cause a jamming in the weapon at some point in time, if you're not 100 percent sure on how to use it. So he had a lot of training, obviously, to set those weapons up the way he did. But that bump stock can cause the weapon to malfunction or jam.
COOPER: And we don't know if in fact, that did and if that in anyway contributed to him not doing it, or was it just the intervention of the security guard?
SAVIDGE: The other thing, you look at in those weapons, at least the photographs that we've seen, some of the weapons are meant for distance shooting, some of the weapons are meant for close-in either defense or fighting.
COOPER: Handgun and shotgun.
SAVIDGE: Well, I mean, even the one that had the hand grip on the very end of the barrel. That is the one that is set up to clear the hallway, maybe, the sheriff saying that there was some 200 rounds he thought were fired in the hallway. That's a staggering number because did he reload? Where did he fire one weapon with 200 rounds?
[20:55:16] So he's got certain weapons that he's using to fire on a crowd, he's got other weapons he's using as defensive or maybe even as part of this escape plan that they talk of.
COOPER: Phil, with so many of these active shooter situations, I mean, according to the FBI's review of all of them since Columbine, I think it's the first six minutes or so in which most of the fatalities take place. Do we know why that is and why they don't go on longer? Is it usually just police response because, in some cases we've seen shooters who kill themselves prior to intervention by the police.
MUDD: Sure. And some of these situations whether you're looking at this or whether you're looking at terror situations that I studied in my career. The individual invests so much of their emotion and actually getting to the location and conducting the attack, that is, they've got to build up to an emotional bubble that says, I'm going to kill people. And when I kill people, most likely I'm going to die myself. What I'm saying, Anderson, is once they get to the actual event, they might not always have thought through, how do I maintain focus for 20 minutes or 30 minutes, so that I can kill 500 people instead of 100 people?
They're invested and actually conducting the event and once they get into the event the emotion is so intense that they might lose focus. They might focus on killing themselves because they don't want to be taken by police. It's the emotion of the event that drives them.
COOPER: There's also, of course, the question of money. Our Dan Simon has been looking into the shooter's finances. Dan, what have you learned so far?
DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No question, Anderson. That is going to be an important part of the conversation and the investigation. We know that the shooter often described himself as a professional gambler. But he was also an active real estate investor, as you have heard.
We know that he bought and sold some 11 properties going back to the 1980s, some of them netting him a small fortune. I just want to give you one example back in 2004, he sold an entire apartment complex in the town of Hawthorne, California. He had his ex-wife and family members as partners with that. They sold that for $3 million. They bought it for $1 million a decade earlier, $2 million net. And so this was an important part of his life.
Just one other thing, when he bought his most recent home in Mesquite, it was an unusual transaction because when he bought that home, he paid for it entirely with cash. And the agents were startled by that. And when he bought that house, he said in passing to those agents, apparently at closing, that he was a professional gambler and that he would gamble a $1 million each year in Las Vegas. Anderson.
COOPER: Phil, I mean just from an investigative standpoint, how much more do you want to know or do investigators need to know about the shooter's financial situation? How significant is that, could that possibly be?
MUDD: It's not simply a question of financial situation, Anderson. It's placing it in the context of a couple of other elements that are going to multiply over time. So we have how much money he acquired, how much money he spent, how much money he invested, how much he gambled. And that's on a timeline. On that timeline as well, I want to know where he moved, when he moved, whether that timeline corresponds with when he found friends, when he lost friends, when he developed a relationship with his girlfriend, when he decided to send her overseas. So it's the money, whether the quantities of money change over time and how they correspond to other changes in his life.
Friendships, romance, geographic movements, that is, when he moved from Mesquite to other residences. And you start to get a pattern of life that might show aberrations. He suddenly lost money, for example, I don't know this, but just speculating, maybe he lost money six months ago and we saw at the same time differences in his relationships with friends. That's really important, Anderson. But you need a lot of data to put together that three-dimensional picture of a life.
COOPER: Juliette, just in terms of the investigation and from what you heard tonight, what else stands out to you?
KAYYEM: So I think most of the focus is going to go on Marilou Danley right now. This is the girlfriend who was with him during this most significant period. It appears that he purchased the guns during a limited period of time, the last year. And she's with him during that time. So she's going to be focused just highlighting what was going on in his life that might actually come to the motivation aspect, the thing that we're so curious about.
I am going to say this again, though. The sheriff does seem to have a theory of the case. He said it out loud, that he does not believe that he could have planned this alone. And so there will be a look for conspirators as well to at least -- with the potential of arrest if they were actually involved with the planning of this.
COOPER: Yes, there's still obviously a lot to be learned in the days and obviously weeks. I mean, obviously this investigation could go on for a very long period of time. And they're, you know, they're not -- they're being very transparent as they can be, but at this point, investigator want to hold back as much as they can.
[21:0013] ART RODERICK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, I mean, you're getting a lot of the information from the sheriff. The FBI has given -- generally the standard answer they give when they're involved in the middle of an investigation.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There's one point they mentioned there. October 2016. Seems to be when there's some kind of shift in his attitude, because that's when the buying spree, this is when we start seeing the 33 guns that were purchased recently in the last year, when that began. So naturally the question mark is, what happened? What went on? Was there something in his life or something?
RODERICK: Exactly. But he also purchased those at different stores.
SAVIDGE: Correct. RODERICK: So he would not be recognized.
COOPER: That's intentional.
RODERICK: That's intentional so.
(CROSSTALK)
RODERICK: Exactly. So he wouldn't be recognized as the same person coming in over the span of a year, purchasing 33 rifles.
COOPER: Phil, just in terms of how much training would somebody need in order to execute a plan like this and to come up with a plan like this? You know, because it does seem relatively sophisticated in terms of creating this, you know, bunker-like atmosphere in that hotel suite, hooking up cameras to monitor the comings and goings, putting a camera on a room service tray table. The sheriff said the gunman had to have had help at some point.
PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: I'm not sure I would read that into what the sheriff said. And I want to make sure we understand his mindset coming into this conversation. And why he's talking about co-conspirators.
If you go into this investigation on your issue of training and whether other people were involved, you have two options. One is three days in you have an option to say, I think he might have acted alone. That is a deadly mistake in this business. You have to go in, regardless of what you know about the case this early on, with this volume of data, with an assumption that says, I cannot be sure that nobody else was involved. When I read the sheriff, he wasn't saying just that he might think, based on his theory, there was a larger conspiracy. He's saying what anybody, including myself, would say.
Until we prove that there is nobody else involved, I've got to assume there's somebody else because I can't come back in 30 days and say, from day one we kind of thought he acted alone, and then we were surprised. You just can't do that in this investigation.
COOPER: It's also interesting, Phil. Again, I keep coming back to the intervention, early intervention, by the hotel security guard who was shot through the doorway, according to law enforcement. And we heard from the sheriff saying some 200 rounds were fired into the hallway. That does seem to be a key moment in turning this killer from the focus outside, where frankly had he continued he could have done a lot more damage, to focusing on the potential of somebody coming through that door.
MUDD: I think that's right. That was one of the most fascinating parts of the entire conversation today. And that is, you've got to assume for a lot of people that I looked at, especially terrorists in this situation, they're anticipating either killing themselves or what we call, unfortunately, suicide by cop. That is, they're going to get involved in a firefight with police or other law enforcement anticipating that they're going to die in the firefight. They're a martyr in that situation. In this, we have a number of clues. In addition to that substantial clue the sheriff gave that he believes or he suggested that this man intended to escape. We've got a lot of other weapons. We have the fact that he looked at the strip and other locations at times previous. He had acquired explosives that were not used in this event. All those taken together, he might have been trying to shoot himself out. The sheriff says he was trying to get to another location. He had materiel he didn't use. You've got did draw the conclusion one of the concerns, here is, he actually, I can't believe this, thought that there would be another event. You've got to ask yourself, where was that and how would he execute that?
COOPER: Yes --
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYS: That's similar --
COOPER: Go ahead Juliette.
KAYYEM: Just quickly, the columbine killers believed the same thing too. They thought that they were going to get out of the high school and actually detonate a bunch of explosives. Their idea is that the escape is going to be as easy as the attack itself, and therefore they are sort of planning the next round. Remember the Boston marathon bombers also thought the same. So their sort of delusions sort of continued past the event itself.
COOPER: Yes, the street around the concert area, we should point it out, has just opened up, giving us a sense of the line of fire from the hotel. Gary Tuchman is there. Gary, explain where you are, what you're seeing.
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, we haven't been able to broadcast here until today, so close to the hotel and to the concert site. But we want to give you a sense of the extraordinary distance these bullets carried. This is where the concert was, the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival. This is across Las Vegas Boulevard, there's eight lanes of traffic, four lanes going to the north, four lanes going to the south.
[21:05:05] And here is the Mandalay Bay Hotel right across the street from it. You can see the broken window on the 32nd floor where the gunman was firing his shots. He's 300 feet in the air when he was firing those shots and the bullets had to carry between 400 and 500 yards across the street. That's about a quarter mile into this concert venue. So this is where everyone was. While he was firing those gunshots those bullets were flying over hundreds of cars. This is a very busy street. And the bullets were flying over the cars going north, going south, and ending up killing 58 people who were at the concert. Anderson.
COOPER: Gary, you know, it wasn't until I got here, I mean, it's hard to again, from the television, it's hard to get a sense just of the distance here. And I think that's one of the things, you know. It's really stunning to see the distance from there to there.
RODERICK: We've been shooting on the other side, and the first day I came over here, all I said was, he had this mapped out very well. And you're right about the distance. I mean, one-quarter of a mile to 500 yards there is within the range of that 223 that we saw lying on the floor, well within the range of the 308.
COOPER: It's also -- he had to have had a sense of the layout of the hotel in order to know -- you can't just look at the hotel, know, OK, that's like the 30-something floor and that's got to be room whatever the room number is. I mean, the hotel is sort of the same from each angle.
RODERICK: He did --
COOPER: He must have asked to have a room facing the venue.
RODERICK: And on the corner, because, you know, he broke the window on the corner here. So he had overlapping firing zones. And the corner one would cover this area over here. And the other one actually looked right straight over the venue. So he was able to hit people trying to escape out of this area over here, but also firing into that mass crowd.
SAVIDGE: Another interesting thing, because I walked that street very carefully this morning now that we're allowed to go through it. And I was expecting that at least somewhere up above in the line of sight going into where the convention was you'd see bullet holes in something, you'd see a ricochet mark, you'd see something. You don't. That is to say it's all been cleaned up. It means that many of his shots landed where he wanted them to go.
COOPER: The panel is going to stand by. On Monday, I want to point out that we met a young survivor here. You may remember named Addison Short. She spoke to from her hospital bed where she was recovering from a gunshot wound to her leg. We spoke to her via FaceTime. Those wounds could have been so much worse, though, if not for the stranger who rescued her. Here's what she said on this broadcast Monday night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ADDISON SHORT, SHOT IN THE LEG DURING SHOOTING SPREE: I just want to -- if the guy that helped me is watching, I really just want to tell him how grateful I am for basically saving my life. And just thank you so much.
COOPER: Do you know who he is? I mean, do you know his name?
SHORT: No, I have no idea. I mean, I remember a little bit of what was he looked like, but no, I didn't get his name.
COOPER: That's amazing, that if he's out there, you want him to know you're thankful.
SHORT: Yes, for sure, because I probably wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for him.
(END VIDEO CLIP) COOPER: We spent the last two days trying to find that hero for Addison. We finally able to reunite him with Addison today, take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMIE JACKSON, HELPED ADDISON ESCAPE SHOOTING SITE: I don't think she remembered. She wasn't acting like she was shot.
COOPER (voice-over): Jamie Jackson comes to Las Vegas every year to attend the Country Music Festival. When shots rang out on Sunday night, he dove for cover and saw a young woman on the ground.
JACKSON: We saw her when we dove under the bar. She came in after. And there was probably about 10 people laying there and her foot, I was laying this way, my wife was right here, and her foot just kind of ended right in front of me and I saw her boot was just soaked through with blood. So I was like, I'm going to take this off. She was in shock, obviously. So when I pulled the boot off, that's when the blood flying out, I was screaming for someone to give me a belt. There was a guy about two over duck in, he threw me the belt, and I held it.
COOPER (on camera): Trying to do a tourniquet or something?
JACKSON: Yes, I was holding it tight, and we were kind of talking, we're trying to figure out -- I was trying to figure out where people are, where people were, so that, you know, we didn't run into gunfire.
COOPER: Right, because that's the thing, you can just as easily run into a bullet as you can running away.
JACKSON: Yes. So, at this point we don't know if it's in the complex or out or in the fairgrounds. And I was kind of looking around, head- poking. I was thinking a lot of time has passed. Like at this point we were there for two or three minutes. This is about two or three minutes after it first started. And there was no cop coming into, you know, by us or I couldn't hear any cops. And then I was thinking, OK, it must be kind of somewhere else. Because they wouldn't run in if there's a sniper or something. And then right above us, we could hear probably like four, five feet above our head bullets going off the stanchions that were there. And I felt like I got hit with something, oh my God, I think I got shot. And then I was looking, and blood all over my hands from her. And I was kind of like, am I bleeding? And the guy beside me was, no, you're not bleeding and then everybody laughed. And it was just me, my wife, and Addison. And I was like, can you walk? And she try, she stood up, she couldn't. So I just kind of grabbed her, still had the tourniquet. Put her on my back. And then we ran around kind of the bar area all the way to -- there was like a wall that had some light posts on it and everybody was hiding behind there. And so I put her there.
Last time I saw her is when I went to go get a scooter. I went back, made sure the tourniquet was tight, and then we took off. And then I think that's when the next person carried her. Because I took my wife, and it was three or four women were running out there, we kind of get it in spaces so it wouldn't be a long line to shoot at.
[21:42] COOPER (on camera): So you didn't know what had happened to her?
JACKSON: I did not know.
COOPER (voice-over): After carrying her to safety Jamie left her with an off-duty police officer who put the woman in a taxi to go to the hospital. He didn't know her name or what happened to her until his mother-in-law saw her interview with me on Monday night.
SHORT: If the guy that helped me is watching, I really just want to tell him how grateful I am for basically saving my life.
COOPER (voice-over): We followed Jamie and his wife Jennifer as they make their way through the hospital to Addison's room.
SHORT: Thank you so much.
JACKSON: You're welcome.
SHORT: Thank you. You have no idea how much I appreciate you guys.
JACKSON: Glad we could help.
SHORT: Thank you.
JACKSON: -- a message. We left you with a cop, and then the whole night I was thinking -- until I saw the interview. I was like --
SHORT: I know. I didn't get anybody's names. I just -- had no -- and then I lost my phone. So, then someone showed me a picture and I was like, yes. That's one of the guys. So -- thank you guys so much.
JENNIFER JACKSON, WIFE OF JAMIE JACKSON: We were worried.
SHORT: Yes, I know. I was worried about you guys too. I was just hoping that you guys were OK.
JACKSON: Glad you're safe and doing good.
SHORT: Thank you.
COOPER (voice-over): The reunion is short maybe 10 or 15 minutes. But Jamie and Jennifer are glad they've made the trip.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.
JACKSON: You're welcome.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can't thank you enough. She was so scared.
COOPER (voice-over): Outside Addison's room, Addison's mom and sister want to say their thanks as well.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm glad you're OK. JACKSON: Thanks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.
JACKSON: I'm so glad you're doing OK and you're going to get out today.
SHORT: Yes, thank you so much. Thank you for coming. I really appreciate it. And thank you guys so much.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Spent a lot of time at a couple of different hospitals today, meeting with people. We'll have some of their stories tomorrow. And other people we just heard were there, talked to them. There are so many people there who are just so grateful to be alive. So grateful for the help of people who still remain strangers to them, whose names they never got, whose faces they can't really remember. There was so much heroism that took place here on Sunday night.
And one person said to me at the hospital who had helped a number of people escape said that the best of America was seen on Sunday night down in that field with all those people going back time and time again to help complete strangers and a lot of lives were saved.
As you know, the president was here earlier meeting with survivors at a hospital also with first responders. CNN's Jim Acosta joins us now. I understand you have some new information about who the president met with?
JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Anderson. White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders she briefed reporters on Air Force One heading back to Washington. Said the president met with some eight families at that hospital earlier today. One interesting story that stands out, apparently the president met with a girl who was shot in the chest during this mass shooting here in Las Vegas, did not realize she had been shot in the chest until later on after she was taken in and treated by medical personnel. Apparently the bullet was right by her heart. That's how close it was. This was on all day long.
The president was also, you heard him earlier today, talking about the killer. He described him as sick and demented. Sarah Sanders was asked about that, what did the president mean about that, did he have some insights into the gunman's psychological makeup? And Sarah Sanders basically told reporters she didn't want to get into that. She didn't have any more information about that.
COOPER: The president was also asked today a number of times, I think, about gun control.
ACOSTA: That's right. The president completely dodged that question, said he didn't want to talk about that today. He is going to have to face that question when he gets back to Washington. He's back in Washington, when he deals with lawmakers tomorrow and Friday. Mainly because there's already talk up on Capitol Hill of banning those so- called bump stocks that allow semi-automatic weapons to be converted into basically automatic weapons that can fire rapidly. Dianne Feinstein, senator from California, is introducing that kind of legislation right now.
[21:15:07] Interestingly, Anderson, Republicans who are normally sort of under the spell of the National Rifle Association are saying they may be on board with this. But the most interesting fact of all, lawmaker after lawmaker, we're talking to reporters earlier today, saying they had no idea these bump stocks existed. So many of these lawmakers who wrap themselves in the flag of the National Rifle Association were firearms illiterate on the subject of bump stocks. And so I think we're going to be hearing about that in the days ahead the president have to deal with that question.
COOPER: Jim Acosta, appreciate the reporting. As always gun control is one of the subjects of the next hour. I want to hand things over right now to Chris Cuomo in the CNN Town Hall with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.
