There are a lot of unknowns surrounding the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, which claimed the lives of 58 people and injured hundreds more.
We still don’t know what motivated the shooter, Stephen Paddock, who authorities said acted alone. We don’t know where he received the sort of training one would need to pull off a massacre of that magnitude.
But Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., suggested this week he knows the real story: The attack was orchestrated by Islamic State agents who infiltrated the United States through the southern border.
The congressman has yet to offer proof of this claim. Nevertheless, his office maintained Friday that Perry has indeed seen compelling evidence showing ISIS had a hand in the shooting.
“Information came to my attention recently, from what I believe to be a highly credible source, regarding possible terrorist involvement in relation to last Fall’s shooting in Las Vegas that claimed 58 lives and wounded hundreds more," the congressman’s office said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
It added, "I’d be derelict in my duties and my Oath of Office if I failed to bring this information forward; I took this action neither lightly nor without grave and diligent thought. I also reached out to the appropriate federal authorities to share this information and did not receive a response. More information regarding this matter will come to light in the coming days. I hope these events spur federal counterterrorism officials to fully investigate ISIS’ claim of responsibility for this massacre.”
The statement comes after Perry appeared Thursday on Fox News to allege ISIS played a role in what happened last year in Clarke County, Nevada.
“I smell a rat, like a lot of Americans do,” he said Thursday evening on Fox News. “Nothing is adding up. It has been four months … we don’t even – the man is dead. They said he is a lone gunman. Lone shooter. Yet, we can’t get the autopsy results.”
That part is true, except it likely has less to do with a vast, widespread conspiracy and more to do with a legal issue raised prior to the Oct. 1, 2017, shooting spree.
As it turns out, all autopsy results in the state are on hold as the Nevada Supreme Court mulls an open records lawsuit filed last July by the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The paper sought legal action after the Clark County Coroner declined to turn over recent death reports. District Judge Jim Crockett ruled in favor of the Review-Journal in September, saying that autopsy reports are a matter of public record. But the coroner’s office soon appealed the decision, leaving the situation in a sort of legal limbo until the state’s supreme court delivers a decision.
“The Clark County Coroner can withhold autopsies sought by the Las Vegas Review-Journal until the Nevada Supreme Court rules on an appeal in the newspaper’s open records lawsuit,” the group reported in December. “After the coroner’s office appealed District Judge Jim Crockett’s September decision on disclosing reports on deaths dating back to 2012, the judge agreed to postpone his Dec. 28 deadline for the coroner to provide the documents.”
Clark County officials argue that such “records reviewed by outside committees [should] remain private” because they “contain medication relating to children.”
Attorneys representing multiple newsrooms, including the Las Vegas-Review Journal, ABC, CNN, KSNV-TV Las Vegas, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and the Associated Press, filed petitions on Nov. 2, 2017, in the US District Court, District of Nevada, and Clark County District Court for release of all records involving the Las Vegas gunman and his shooting spree.
If you think the Pennsylvania congressman’s autopsy theorizing is wild, buckle up.
“But even more troubling than [the lack of autopsy],” Perry said Thursday, “recently I’ve been made aware of what I believe to be credible evidence – credible information regarding potential terrorist infiltration through the southern border regarding this incident.”
The Fox host, Tucker Carlson, interjected to say, “terrorist connections? So what’s the outline of that?”
“Let’s face it: ISIS twice before the attack warned the United States that they would attack Las Vegas, I think in June and August,” the congressman said. “And then after the attack claimed responsibility four times. Meanwhile the local law enforcement investigative services are telling us there is no terrorist connection. Lone gunman.”
“Something is not adding up,” he added.
First, as Perry himself noted, there have been multiple ISIS-inspired attacks in the United States since 2014. Six, to be exact. We know all about these events. They've been well-reported. Yet, authorities are conspiring just now to hide the supposed truth of the Las Vegas shooting secret? What — did officials reach their ISIS-related incident limit at seven?
Secondly, it’s entirely possible ISIS is lying. They don’t often take credit for attacks in which they played no role or didn’t act as the inspiration, but it’s not unheard of. Recall that they wrongly took credit for the June 2017 shooting spree at a casino in Manila, Philippines. They also claimed in September of last year that they were the reason that a flight was evacuated at Charles de Gaulle Airport. This proved to be a lie.
Lastly, as Graeme Wood noted for the Atlantic, consider that the Las Vegas massacre is missing the normal tell-tale signs of ISIS involvement: “[N]o cell-phone video from the killer, pledging allegiance in broken Arabic; no selfies of him, raising a finger of monotheism.”
“Another absent sign of Islamic State involvement is videos from Paddock’s rifle-scope,” Wood added. “At attacks like the Holey Bakery in Dhaka, Bangladesh, the killers have uploaded real-time images, exclusive and corroborating imagery for Amaq. As with many subsequently verified attacks, we have not yet, in these early hours, seen any such evidence.”
It has been three months and we still haven’t seen any of the normal signs of ISIS engagement, let alone signs that foreign operatives came up through the southern border to assist, train or aid Paddock. All we have is ISIS' cheering and boasting. What’s the world coming to when you can’t take a maniacal terrorist organization at its word?
