Nicholas Crosby has one week to show the judge evidence that could lead to an indictment.
Charges could be forthcoming in Stephen Paddock’s mass shooting on October 1 from a suite in the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino, according to recently released court documents. The possibility of charges was noted by Nicholas Crosby, the attorney for Metropolitan Police, when arguing the merits of the case State District Court Judge Elissa Cadish.
Crosby characterized the probe as an ongoing investigation. That was the prosecutor’s justification for keeping court documents sealed.
Judge Cadish ruled that the files would not be released right away. Instead, she agreed to give Las Vegas police one more week to explain the need for ongoing secrecy.
Nicholas Crosby’s Revelation
Fox News said Nicholas Crosby’s revelations were a surprise to most of those in the courtroom. The prosecutor gave no indication who would face charges in the case. Crosby noted he could not argue the face of the case, because it would compromise the person or people the police were seeking to protect. The prosecutor would prefer an in-camera hearing.
The Las Vegas Review Journal sought to release the documents on First Amendment grounds. Maggie McLetchie, who serves as the Las Vegas Review Journal’s attorney, said the public has a right to know what is in the investigation. She said that prosecutors could claim their probe was “ongoing” perpetually, thus never allowing the documents to be released.
The Review Journal’s lawyer stated, “Just because Mr. Paddock shot himself doesn’t mean the public doesn’t have a right to know what’s in the documents.”
Marilou Danley Documents
The latest attempts to open court documents came after a decision last Friday to release 315 pages involving federal search warrants in the case. Those documents involved digital and land-based searches of the belongings of Marilou Danley, the onetime girlfriend of the Mandalay Bay shooter, Stephen Paddock.
Previous documents suggested that prosecuters did not see Marilou Danley as a potential accomplice. Instead, she is described as a cooperating witness with a solid alibi and a backstory which seemed to check out. Though Danley’s fingerprints appeared on some ammunition used in the mass shooting, she had told investigations that likely would be the case, because she had helped load ammo into cartridges well before the fateful shooting.
Officials to Bring Charges in Mandalay Bay Shooting?
Prosecutors’ claims they might bring charges in the Mandalay Bay shooting are hard to assess. It might be government lawyers want to preserve the evidence in the small chance they find an accomplice, even though that evidence is not in their hands now. It might be prosecutors want to keep the evidence from the public until their full investigation ends and the judge will rule in the next week their claims are not valid. Part of the ruling states Nicholas Crosby needs to prove his claims within the week.
All that being said, investigators might be found emails in the large trove of electronic communications which suggests Stephen Paddock was radicalized by someone, or had one or more accomplices along the way. Stephen Paddock appears to have been a psychologically unstable loner who murdered 58 people for his own esoteric reasons.
Whatever warped thinking and anti-social behavior Stephen Paddock might have exhibited seems to have been masked by his own brilliance, along with his wealth. The old saying goes, “The poor are crazy, the rich just eccentric.”
Whether that old saying is true or not, Marilou Danley does not appear to be the possible accomplice in the Mandalay Bay shooting. In the coming weeks, Las Vegas-area prosecutors might have revelations which will change public perception on the motives behind the mass shooting.
