روما بت
ماه بت
پین باهیس
بهترین سایت شرط بندی
بت کارت
یاس بت
یک بت
مگاپاری
اونجا بت
alvinbet.org
بت برو
بت فا
بت فوروارد
وان ایکس بت
1win giriş
بت وینر
بهترین سایت شرط بندی ایرانی
1xbet giriş
وان کیک بت
وین بت
ریتزو بت
1xbet-ir.com.co/
https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/paperiounblocked2?lang=EN https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/agariounblockedschool1?lang=EN https://yohoho-io.app/ https://2.yohoho-io.net/paper.io unblocked https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/yohoho-unblocked-76?lang=EN https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/agariounblockedpvp https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/yohoho?lang=EN
HomeBREAKING NEWSLas Vegas Killer's Family Had History of Violence, Mental Disorders

Las Vegas Killer’s Family Had History of Violence, Mental Disorders

Published on

Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas Strip shooter gunman behind the deadliest mass shooting in US history, had a family history of gun violence. His father, Bejamin Hoskins Paddock, was a part-time bank robber and swindler with a history of running afoul of the law.

The toll from Stephen Paddock’s deadly Sunday 

image-15207

So far, it is known that Paddock was a 64-year-old retired accountant living in his own home in a retirement community about 130 km northeast of Las Vegas. An affluent, twice-divorced man, Paddock was a licensed pilot and owned two small pleasure aircraft. He owned several rental properties, and enjoyed gambling, concerts and cruises. A licensed hunter, the would-be killer reportedly owned at least 42 guns, nearly a dozen of which were found in his hotel room following the massacre, with another 19 found at his property, in addition to explosives and several thousand rounds of ammo.

Paddock’s backstory doesn’t help to explain what drove him to commit the heinous act. Nor does it help that Paddock made no effort to make his motives clear before taking dozens of lives and committing suicide on the night of the shooting.

Crime Runs in the Family

One intriguing detail emerging from Paddock’s biography is the story of his father, Benjamin Hoskins Paddock, a WWII veteran, salesman and repairman in Tucson, Arizona who turned to robbing banks.

A clipping from the October 6, 1960 issue of the Arizona Republic newspaper reported that Paddock, a three-time bank robber, had been indicted along with a co-conspirator on three counts of robbing Phoenix, Arizona branches of the Valley National Bank between 1959 and 1960, stealing $25,000 in cash over the course of the three forays. After being arrested in Las Vegas following his last caper, Paddock was convicted in 1961 and sentenced to 20 years in a West Texas federal prison. According to other articles from the same period, Paddock was arrested following a dramatic confrontation with FBI agents in which he attempted to run one of them down with his car. The agents responded by riddling his windshield with bullets.

Stephen Paddock, the would-be mass killer, was seven years old when his father was first arrested. 

image-15208

In 1968, Benjamin Paddock escaped confinement and fled to San Francisco, where he was accused of robbing another bank, and then headed up the US West Coast, settling in Oregon and changing his name to Bruce Werner Ericksen. Between 1969 and 1977, Paddock’s name was on the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. Said to have been a diagnosed psychopath, Paddock’s record also included automobile larceny and fraud.

An FBI poster from the time warned that Paddock had “suicidal tendencies and should be considered armed and very dangerous.”

Federal agents caught up with Paddock’s father on the night of September 6, 1979 in Springfield, Oregon, where he had become the manager of a bingo center, gaining a local reputation as “Bingo Bruce.” Two more years were added to his prison sentence, but he was paroled less than a year later, according to an archived article from the Eugene Register-Guard, after receiving a petition signed by 1,600 Springfield residents pleading for his release. After his return home, he continued to run bingo parlors for several more years.

In 1987, Oregon’s attorney general hit Paddock with seven racketeering and fraud charges, which he was able to settle for a fine of $623,000, allowing him to avoid jail time. Paddock moved to Arlington, Texas, spending the last decade of his life there, and dying in 1998 at age 71.

According to brother Eric Paddock, Stephen Paddock had no criminal history, and Sunday’s massacre was a complete shock to him. At the same time, Eric confirmed that the brothers weren’t exactly close to their father. Confirming that Benjamin Paddock was their father, Eric told media that their father was “rarely around.”

Latest articles

Philadelphia DC 33 strikers: ‘When we fight, we win!’

Philadelphia As the historic strike by 9,000 members of Philadelphia’s American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 33 continues, workers’ militancy is escalating, and support for them is growing. Mountains of uncollected garbage are growing at official city collection sites in neighborhoods around the city. Some have been dubbed “the Parker Piles”…

Tribute to Patrice Lumumba on his birth centenary, including Frantz Fanon’s essay

By Fausto Giudice, July 2, 2025 Workers World thanks Fausto Giudice of Tlaxcala for this tribute to Patrice Lumumba and for combining it with a tribute to his contemporary African revolutionary, Algeria’s Frantz Fanon, and for including a poem by Langston Hughes. For readers unaware of this important event in African history, a look at…

‘Hideous and revolting’ – Frederick Douglass on U.S. slavery

The following excerpts are from the powerful speech entitled “What to the slave is 4th of July,” made by Frederick Douglass, the great African-American abolitionist who escaped from slavery, at an independence day rally in Rochester, New York, on July 5, 1852.  In light of Trump’s racist attacks on “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion,” i.e., even…

US presentation of Operation Midnight Hammer, by Dorothy Shea

In accordance with Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, I wish to report on behalf of my Government that on 22 June 2025 the Armed Forces of the United States exercised the inherent right of collective self-defence and advanced vital United States interests in eliminating Iran’s nuclear programme by conducting a precision…

More like this

Philadelphia DC 33 strikers: ‘When we fight, we win!’

Philadelphia As the historic strike by 9,000 members of Philadelphia’s American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 33 continues, workers’ militancy is escalating, and support for them is growing. Mountains of uncollected garbage are growing at official city collection sites in neighborhoods around the city. Some have been dubbed “the Parker Piles”…

Tribute to Patrice Lumumba on his birth centenary, including Frantz Fanon’s essay

By Fausto Giudice, July 2, 2025 Workers World thanks Fausto Giudice of Tlaxcala for this tribute to Patrice Lumumba and for combining it with a tribute to his contemporary African revolutionary, Algeria’s Frantz Fanon, and for including a poem by Langston Hughes. For readers unaware of this important event in African history, a look at…

‘Hideous and revolting’ – Frederick Douglass on U.S. slavery

The following excerpts are from the powerful speech entitled “What to the slave is 4th of July,” made by Frederick Douglass, the great African-American abolitionist who escaped from slavery, at an independence day rally in Rochester, New York, on July 5, 1852.  In light of Trump’s racist attacks on “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion,” i.e., even…