You’ve all heard about the Vegas mass shooting by now but in case you need a recap… Stephen Craig Paddock shot into the crowd of the Las Vegas Route 91 Harvest country music festival on Oct. 2nd. 58 people thus far are confirmed dead with at least 400 being injured.
Paddock was found dead inside his hotel room from suicide.
Now one survivor, Taylor Benge, a self-proclaimed agnostic, is coming forward and saying he is a “firm believer in God.”
“I was agnostic going into that concert and I’m a firm believer in God now,” said Benge, on Monday morning. “Because there’s no way that all of that happened and that I made it and I was blessed enough to still be here alive talking to you today.”
“My sister and I, we started running to the left and every time they shot, we took cover,” he said. “My sister, being as noble as she, she actually threw herself on top of me and was saying, ‘I love you Taylor, I love you.’”
“And I’ll never forget that,” he added.
Here’s what we know thus far of the Las Vegas Shooter:
Mr. Paddock and his three brothers were raised by their mother, who told the children that their father had died when in fact he was in prison, Eric Paddock said. Mr. Paddock’s father was convicted in 1961 of committing a series of bank robberies, and was sentenced to 20 years, but escaped from La Tuna federal prison in Texas in 1968 and then became a used-car dealer and bingo parlor operator in Oregon.
Stephen Paddock attended college, his family said, and worked for a predecessor company to Lockheed Martin, the aerospace contracting company, from 1985 to 1988. Lockheed Martin confirmed his employment but did not identify the company for which Mr. Paddock worked.
Mr. Paddock bought three guns — a handgun and two rifles — at a shop in Mesquite, Guns & Guitars, within the last year, said Christopher Sullivan, the general manager. All the purchases were legal and cleared routine federal screening, Mr. Sullivan said.
Mr. Paddock seemed to have no criminal history, according to records searches in places where he was known to have lived. The Mesquite Police Department said they had no interactions with the couple, including traffic stops.
When police stormed his room shortly before midnight, Mr. Paddock lay dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He left behind 23 guns in the hotel suite, including two rifles mounted on tripods, 19 guns in his house, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, broken windows, and a trail of questions by family members and neighbors who are struggling to make sense of his motive. His car remained parked with the hotel valet.
He owned several homes and properties across the country, according to a review of public records.
Several people said Mr. Paddock played video poker and card games and had recently won a $20,000 jackpot, a celebrated event at the casino.
