In Las Vegas, children found caged with signs of harrowing abuse

Las-Vegas-children-in-cages

Important Takeaways:

  • Disturbing video shows police rescuing kids from cages at Las Vegas hotel room after couple believed one had been beaten to death
  • Las Vegas Metro Police arrested 33-year-old Amanda Stamper and 31-year-old Travis Doss on June 11 after she called 911 from a Walgreens store that was near their residence at an extended stay hotel unit.
  • Court documents alleged that Stamper told police Doss had told her that he had kicked one of the children in the head and that he believed the child was dead.
  • The video shows police entering the unit and finding two children in what appear to be dog kennels. Four other children were in the unit. All showed signs of child abuse, and all were aged 11 or under.
  • The two caged children were aged 9 and 11 years old but had trouble walking after they were released, according to police.
  • Vegas police said it was one of the worst cases of abuse they had ever seen.

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Las Vegas investigation ensues after journalist stabbed to death outside home

2 Timothy 3:1-5 “But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.

Important Takeaways:

  • Police search home of Democrat official in connection with stabbing of investigative journalist Jeff German
  • Clark County administrator Robert Telles lost an election following Jeff German’s reports
  • Officers entered the home of Clark County public administrator Robert Telles Wednesday morning, according to The Las Vegas Review-Journal. German had written extensively about the alleged hostile work environment Telles reportedly ran at the city office, as well as a reported inappropriate relationship with a staffer.
  • “The Clark County Public Administrator’s office has been mired in turmoil and internal dissension over the past two years, with allegations of emotional stress, bullying and favoritism leading to secret videotaping of the boss and a co-worker outside the office,” reads one of his articles, published in May.
  • Police have not stated that Telles is a suspect in German’s fatal stabbing. Telles’ office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox.

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Virgin Hyperloop shows off the future: mass transport in floating magnetic pods

By Rollo Ross

(Reuters) – In the desert just north of Las Vegas, a long white metal tube sits at the base of the mountains, promising to one day revolutionize travel.

That is where Virgin Hyperloop, whose partners include Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, is developing the technology for passenger pods that will hurtle at speeds of up to 750 miles an hour (1,200 kph) through almost air-free vacuum tunnels using magnetic levitation.

“It will feel like an aircraft at take-off and once you’re at speed,” said co-founder and Chief Executive Josh Giegel, who gave Reuters an exclusive tour of the pod used in its November test run, where it was propelled along a 500 meter (1,640 ft)tunnel.

“You won’t even have turbulence because our system is basically completely able to react to all that turbulence. Think noise-canceling but bump-canceling, if you will.”

Off-white materials and a back mirror make the pod seem bigger and more “inviting” for new users, Giegel said.

“This pod was really the embodiment of ‘How do we take something that’s an idea and make it into something that’s a reality for us to sit in?’ Giegel said.

The pods will seat 28 passengers and could be customized for long and short distances, and for freight.

While it is still at an early stage, Giegel predicts commercial operations as early as 2027. It could be the first form of transport in 100 years to revolutionize travel, just like cars, trains and planes did, Giegel said.

Rocket scientist Robert Goddard came up with the “vactrain” idea in the early 1900’s. France tried to develop the Aerotrain in the 1960s and 1970s, but lack of funding killed the project.

Entrepreneur Elon Musk reignited interest in 2013 by setting out how a modern system would work. Giegel, who worked at Musk’s SpaceX at the time, said technology is now catching up.

The required batteries, power electronics and some sensors were previously not quite ready, Giegel said. “We’re at like the very bleeding edge of what a high-speed autonomous battery-powered vehicle is.”

Virgin Hyperloop is looking to first develop passenger routes in India, where the transport system is overloaded, and in Saudi Arabia, which lacks an infrastructure.

“It starts off with two people riding a Hyperloop. It ends with hundreds of millions of people riding on a Hyperloop and that’s what the 2020’s, the roaring 20’s will be,” Giegel said.

The pod will be on display at the Smithsonian Historic Arts and Industries Museum’s “FUTURES” exhibition in Washington in late summer.

(Reporting by Rollo Ross; Editing by Richard Chang)

Walmart to test drone delivery of COVID-19 test kits

(Reuters) – Walmart Inc. said on Tuesday it would run a pilot project to deliver self-collection test kits for coronavirus through automated drones at customers’ doorsteps.

The U.S. retailer has partnered with Quest Diagnostics and drone services provider DroneUp, to test-deliver collection kits in north Las Vegas from Tuesday and plans to conduct a trial run in Cheektowaga, New York in early October.

Earlier this month, Walmart piloted drone delivery of grocery and household products in Fayetteville, North Carolina, as it accelerated the expansion of its pickup and delivery services with virus-wary consumers preferring home delivery.

The drones launched on Tuesday will drop the COVID-19 self-collection kits on driveways, front sidewalks or backyards of homes within a one-mile radius of designated Walmart stores.

Customers can self-administer the nasal swab and send back samples to Quest Diagnostics for testing.

Walmart has also teamed up with Zipline to make on-demand deliveries of select health and wellness products near its headquarters in northwest Arkansas.

(Reporting by Vishwadha Chander in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)

Grasshoppers take Vegas by swarm, disrupting weather radar, tourism

FILE PHOTO: A grasshopper lands on a window in Encinitas, California, U.S. October 29,2018. REUTERS/Mike Blake

(Reuters) – Swarms of grasshoppers have descended upon America’s Sin City in unusual abundance this week, disrupting weather radars, deterring tourists and invoking hysteria on social media.

The clouds of buzzing insects, whose migration through the Las Vegas Valley scientists say is the result of a wetter-than-normal winter, were big enough that the National Weather Service detected them on its radar.

“Radar analysis suggests most of these echoes are biological targets. This typically includes birds, bats, and bugs, and most likely in our case…grasshoppers,” the National Weather Service in Las Vegas said on Friday on Twitter.

Such migrations occur every few years and should not cause alarm since the insects are not dangerous, Jeff Knight, state entomologist for the Nevada Department of Agriculture, said on Thursday at a news conference.

Some locals were not placated.

“This is the wildest thing in nature I’ve ever seen,” one resident, Caitlin Sparks, wrote on Twitter on Sunday, posting a photograph of a street lamp illuminating a night sky filled with grasshoppers.

Attracted to ultra-violet light, the insects have been clustering around the city’s brightly lit tourist district, a concentration of resort hotels and casinos along The Strip. The Luxor Sky Beam, a pillar of light that rises from the Luxor Hotel, has attracted huge swarms at night, according to videos posted to Twitter.

The Best Western Plus Casino Royale on the Strip shut off its lights on Friday and Saturday to avoid attracting the bugs, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

(Reporting by Gabriella Borter; Editing by Andrea Ricci)

South Carolina capital could be first U.S. city to ban gun bump stocks

An example of a bump stock that attaches to a semi-automatic rifle to increase the firing rate is seen at Good Guys Gun Shop in Orem, Utah, U.S. on October 4, 2017.

By Harriet McLeod

(Reuters) – South Carolina’s capital on Tuesday could become the first U.S. city to ban the use of bump stocks, a gun accessory that has drawn national scrutiny after being found among the Las Vegas mass shooter’s arsenal of weapons in the October rampage.

Last month, Massachusetts became the first state to pass a law that explicitly bans bump stocks.

Steve Benjamin, the mayor of Columbia, the South Carolina capital, said the city council was expected in a vote on Tuesday night to approve an ordinance barring the devices, which allow semiautomatic rifles to fire hundreds of rounds a minute like fully automatic machine guns.

“One of the common refrains that you hear, whether it was in Texas or Vegas or Sandy Hook, is that a good guy with a gun could have stopped the carnage,” Benjamin, a Democrat, said in a phone interview on Monday. “It’s time for the good guys with guns to begin to pass some really good policy.”

Authorities said Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock had 12 rifles outfitted with bump stocks in the hotel room where he launched his attack on an outdoor concert, killing 58 people and wounding hundreds in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Since then several states and cities have proposed measures outlawing or restricting the attachments, and the U.S. Justice Department said earlier this month it was considering a ban on certain bump stocks.

California and New York do not prohibit bump stocks outright, but the devices fall under the definition of an automatic weapon, which are illegal in those states, according to Anne Teigen, who covers firearm legislation for the National Conference of State Legislatures. Some other states and the District of Columbia have assault weapons bans that could include bump stocks.

“We are not aware of any cities that have passed ordinancesbanning bump stocks,” said Tom Martin, a spokesman for the National League of Cities.

In Columbia, four of the council’s six members approved the city’s proposed ordinance on a first reading earlier this month.

The measure also would ban the use of other gun attachments that allow rifles to fire faster. Owners would be required to keep them stored separately from any weapon.

Trigger-enhancing devices are not gun parts, gun components, weapons or ammunition, which state law prohibits cities from regulating, Benjamin said.

The mayor, who has a background in law enforcement and said he owns guns, said the measure had drawn support from local police and council members who support the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protecting gun ownership rights.

(Reporting by Harriet McLeod in Charleston, South Carolina; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Leslie Adler)

Texas gunman’s in-laws sometimes attended church, sheriff says

The playground at the site of a shooting at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 6, 2017.

By Jon Herskovitz and Lisa Maria Garcia

SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, Texas (Reuters) – A man thrown out of the U.S. Air Force for beating his wife and child shot and killed 26 people in a Texas church where his in-laws had sometimes worshipped before shooting himself, officials said on Monday, in the latest in a string of U.S. mass shootings.

The gunman, Devin Patrick Kelley, 26, walked into the white-steepled First Baptist Church in rural Sutherland Springs carrying an assault rifle and wearing black tactical gear, then opened fire during a Sunday prayer service. He wounded at least 20 others, officials said.

After he left the church, two local residents, one of whom was armed, chased him in their vehicles and exchanged gunfire, and Kelley crashed his car and shot himself, dying of his wounds, Wilson County Sheriff Joe Tackitt told CBS News in an interview on Monday morning.

“At this time we believe that he had a self-inflicted gunshot wound,” Tackitt said.

Tackitt said Kelley’s in-laws sometimes attended services at First Baptist, which was cordoned off by yellow crime-scene tape on Monday morning.

“I heard that they attended church from time to time,” Tackitt told Reuters. “Not on a regular basis.”

The attack came a little more than a month after a gunman killed 58 people in Las Vegas in the deadliest shooting by a sole gunman in U.S. history.

The initial death toll matched the fatalities at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, where a man shot and killed 26 children and educators and his mother before taking his own life in December 2012. Those attacks now stand as the fourth deadliest by a single gunman in the United States.

 

‘POWDER KEG’

Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott told CBS there was evidence that Kelley had mental health problems and that he had been denied a Texas gun permit.

“It’s clear this is a person who had violent tendencies, who had some challenges, and someone who was a powder keg, seeming waiting to go off,” Abbott said.

Abbott and other Republican leaders were quick to say that the attack did not influence their support of gun ownership by U.S. citizens – the right to bear arms protected under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

“This isn’t a guns situation. I mean we could go into it but it’s a little bit soon to go into it,” U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters while on trip to Asia. “But fortunately somebody else had a gun that was shooting in the opposite direction, otherwise … it would have been much worse. But this is a mental health problem at the highest level.”

Democrats renewed their call to restrict gun ownership following the attack.

“How many more people must die at churches or concerts or schools before we stop letting the @NRA control this country’s gun policies,” Democratic U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren said on Twitter.

The victims in Sutherland Springs, a community of fewer than 400 people, located about 40 miles (65 km) east of San Antonio, included the 14-year-old daughter of church pastor Frank Pomeroy, the family told several television stations.

A woman prays after a mass shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 5, 2017. Nick Wagner/AMERICAN-STATESMAN via REUTERS

A woman prays after a mass shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 5, 2017. Nick Wagner/AMERICAN-STATESMAN via REUTERS

One couple, Joe and Claryce Holcombe, told the Washington Post they lost eight extended family members, including a pregnant granddaughter-in-law and three of her children.

In rural areas like Sutherland Springs, gun ownership is a part of life and the state’s Republican leaders for years have balked at gun control, arguing that more firearms among responsible owners make the state safer.

John Stiles, a 76-year-old retired U.S. Navy veteran, said he heard the shots from his home about 150 yards (137 m) from the church.

“The wind was blowing and there was a bang, bang, bang. It was the gunshots,” Stiles said. “My wife and I were looking for a peaceful and quiet place when we moved here but now that hasn’t worked out.”

Kelley served in its Logistics Readiness unit at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico from 2010 until his discharge in 2014, according to the U.S. Air Force.

Kelley was court-martialed in 2012 on charges of assaulting his wife and child, and given a bad-conduct discharge, confinement for 12 months and a reduction in rank, Air Force spokeswoman Ann Stefanek said.

Kelley’s Facebook page has been deleted, but cached photos show a profile picture where he appeared with two small children. He also posted a photo of what appeared to be an assault rifle, writing a post that read: “She’s a bad bitch.”

 

(Additional reporting by Bernie Woodall in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas, Phil Stewart in Washington, and Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Jeffrey Benkoe)

 

Las Vegas hotel guard says he heard drilling, then hail of bullets

FILE PHOTO: A candlelight vigil is pictured on the Las Vegas strip following a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Country Music Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., October 2, 2017. Picture taken October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Chris Wattie/File Photo

By Ian Simpson

(Reuters) – A hotel security guard wounded by the Las Vegas gunman who killed 58 people told a U.S. television talk show on Wednesday that he heard drilling before the shooter began spraying a hallway with hundreds of rapid-fire rounds.

Mandalay Bay security guard Jesus Campos, the first person to confront gunman Stephen Paddock, gave “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” his first public account of how he responded to the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Contradictory statements from police and the hotel about what time Campos arrived at Paddock’s room have raised questions about the police response. Campos himself came under increased scrutiny last week after he skipped out on scheduled television interviews.

The guard told DeGeneres he had been called to check on an open stairwell door near Paddock’s suite on the 32nd floor. He found it was blocked by a metal bracket, and he called hotel security to send up a building engineer.

“At that time I heard what I assumed was drilling sounds and I believed that they were in the area working somehow,” said Campos, who was joined for the interview by the engineer, Stephen Schuck.

Campos said he took cover when Paddock began shooting from behind the door.

“I felt a burning sensation. I went to go lift my pant leg up and I saw the blood. That’s when I called it in on my radio that shots have been fired,” he said.

After he was hit, Campos said, he used his cellphone to call the hotel’s security desk in order to keep the emergency radio frequencies clear.

When Schuck arrived on the 32nd floor, Campos “leaned out and he said, ‘Take cover! Take cover!’ and yelled at me,” Schuck said. “Within milliseconds, if he didn’t say that, I would have got hit.”

Police have said that Paddock, a 64-year-old avid gambler, fatally shot himself before they entered the room. He wounded almost 550 people when he opened fire on an outdoor concert from his window, according to authorities, and strafed the hotel hallway with about 200 bullets.

Las Vegas police on Friday presented a third version of the timeline for the shooting that showed they responded immediately to the gunfire, and that Paddock shot Campos at about the same time he opened fire on concertgoers.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson in Washington; editing by Daniel Wallis and G Crosse)

Las Vegas police say no delay in massacre response

Las Vegas police say no delay in massacre response

(Reuters) – Las Vegas police presented a third version on Friday of the timeline of events for the Las Vegas gunman who killed 58 people and himself, saying they responded immediately to the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo, who oversees the Las Vegas police department, told reporters that gunman Stephen Paddock shot at Mandalay Bay hotel security guard Jesus Campos outside his room on Oct. 1 at about the same time he opened fire on the more than 20,000 concertgoers at an outdoor venue.

Previously, police said that Paddock shot Campos six minutes before he started firing on the crowd, raising questions as to whether police and hotel security could have acted faster to prevent casualties in the attack.

“Nobody is attempting to hide anything. The dynamics and the size of the investigation require us to go through voluminous amounts of information in order to draw an accurate picture,” Lombardo said of the changing timeline.

The police account is similar to one given on Thursday by the hotel operator MGM Resorts International <MGM.N>, which said in a statement that Paddock opened fire on Campos and the crowd at the same time or within 40 seconds.

Campos was shot in the leg when Paddock strafed the hallway with about 200 bullets, police said.

Paddock, who placed cameras in the hotel hallway to monitor activity, also injured 546 people before killing himself. No motive for the attack has been made public.

The third timeline could affect claims brought by some victims that depend on the hotel’s allegedly delayed response after Campos was shot. One attorney told Reuters MGM may have acted quickly but questioned whether “reasonable precautions” were in place.

Most of the wounded have been discharged from hospitals, but 45 were still hospitalized, some with critical injuries, Lombardo said.

Lombardo said law enforcement had acted heroically on the night of the attack and that he was angered by the criticism his department has received over its investigation.

“In the public space, the word incompetence has been brought forward and I am absolutely offended with that characterization,” he said.

Aaron Rouse, special agent in charge of the Las Vegas Federal Bureau of Investigation office, said there was no information Paddock was a member of an extremist group. Rouse added the FBI has hundreds of agents on the case working with local law enforcement.

“Nothing will be overlooked. We have made significant progress,” Rouse said. Neither Lombardo nor Rouse took questions.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas; Additional reporting by Ben Klayman in Detroit and Gina Cherelus in New York; Editing by Susan Thomas and Cynthia Osterman)

Las Vegas gunman fired on guard and crowd at about same time: MGM

The site of the Route 91 music festival mass shooting is seen outside the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S. October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

By Keith Coffman

(Reuters) – The owner of the hotel where a gunman carried out the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history on Thursday provided a new version of the timeline, suggesting there was no time for hotel staff to warn police.

Stephen Paddock opened fire on Mandalay Bay hotel security guard Jesus Campos and the crowd attending an outdoor concert nearby at the same time, or within 40 seconds of each other, MGM Resorts International <MGM.N> said in a statement.

Police have still not determined a motive for the shooting.

MGM’s account differed from the updated timeline Las Vegas police provided on Monday, when they said Campos had been shot six minutes before Paddock opened fire on the crowd from his 32nd-floor suite and killed 58 people on Oct. 1. MGM said on Tuesday the revised police timeline might not be accurate.

A Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department spokesman, Officer Larry Hadfield, said the police would have no immediate comment on the hotel’s latest statement. The Las Vegas office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation could not immediately be reached for comment.

Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo, who oversees the Las Vegas police department, on Wednesday defended the speed of the police response in an interview with the Las Vegas CBS television affiliate.

“No matter what that timeline was, the response was as quick as possible. I don’t think the response could have been any faster,” Lombardo said in a video posted on the station’s LasVegasNow.com website.

The revised timeline police provided on Monday raised new questions, including why Paddock ceased firing on concert-goers once he began, and whether hotel security and police coordinated as well as first believed.

MGM said the 9:59 p.m. time that police said is when Campos was shot was derived from a hotel report created manually after the fact without the benefit of information the hotel now has.

“We are now confident that the time stated in this report is not accurate,” MGM said. “We know that shots were being fired at the festival lot at the same time as, or within 40 seconds after, the time Jesus Campos first reported that shots were fired over the radio.”

Las Vegas police officers were with armed hotel security officers in the building when Campos, who was checking an open-door alarm also on the 32nd floor, first reported that shots were fired over the radio, MGM said. Both groups immediately responded to the 32nd floor.

The police have said they assembled a SWAT team and burst into Paddock’s room to find him dead 81 minutes after the shooting began.

“We will continue to work with law enforcement as we have from the first moments of this tragedy as they work toward developing an accurate timeline,” MGM said.

MGM’s new timeline is a blow to lawyers representing some of the victims, whose claims depend heavily on the hotel’s allegedly delayed response following the shooting of Campos. A lawsuit filed in Nevada state court on Tuesday on behalf of a California woman injured in the shooting alleged the hotel acted negligently by responding too late.

Neama Rahmani, a Los Angeles lawyer representing some of the victims, said in an email on Thursday that MGM may have acted quickly, “but the question of whether reasonable precautions were in place remains.”

(Reporting by Keith Coffman in Denver; Additional reporting by Tina Bellon in New York; Writing by Ben Klayman,; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Leslie Adler)