Legal action after the mass shooting at a Las Vegas concert picked up Wednesday with lawsuits filed on behalf of 14 concertgoers, including some who were shot or injured trying to escape and one woman who said she is so traumatized that she has since mistaken the sound of rain for gunshots.
Named as defendants are the hotel-casino from which Stephen Paddock fired, concert organizers and the makers and sellers of a bump stock gun accessory that enabled him to fire rapidly. The court filings argue that they all share blame for the worst mass shooting in recent U.S. history.
The 14 civil complaints, filed together in state court in Las Vegas, follow at least three others filed since Paddock opened fire Oct. 1 from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel and casino, killing 58 people and injuring hundreds of others. The lawsuit seeks unspecific compensation for both “physical and mental injuries.”
A Chicago law firm helped to prepare the filings, which include several plaintiffs from the Chicago area. Victims named in the suits include a California man, Anthony Crisci, who was rushed to a hospital with a gunshot wound in a truck crowded with dead and injured people.
Among the deficiencies at the concert venue were poorly marked exits, Wednesday’s filings say. And the hotel, the filings say, should have had gunfire-location devices that pinpoint where shots are being fired.
The 64-year-old Paddock, who killed himself just before his room was stormed, is also named in a bid to seize assets from his estate.