Thread: 50 killed in shooting at Florida gay nightclub

MIAMI (AFP) - An unidentified gunman opened fire inside a crowded gay nightclub in Florida early Sunday (June 12), killing about 20 people in what police described as a “mass casualty” event.

AFP, quoting a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) official, said the bureau was investigating the shooting as an "act of terrorism".

Police said the shooter was dead, four hours after the incident began with a volley of gunfire in the Pulse nightclub in downtown Orlando, triggering a massive deployment of police and emergency vehicles.

“We can confirm this is a mass casualty situation,” the Orlando police said on their Twitter account.

We can confirm this is a mass casualty situation. Support from local/state/federal agencies. We expect to brief media shortly.

— Orlando Police (@OrlandoPolice) June 12, 2016
“The shooter inside the club is dead,” they said in a separate tweet. Another tweet delivered after a briefing by the FBI the grim news that about 20 people had been killed inside the club.

Pulse Shooting: The shooter inside the club is dead.
— Orlando Police (@OrlandoPolice) June 12, 2016

Pulse nightclub shooting: Approximately 20 people dead inside the club.
— Orlando Police (@OrlandoPolice) June 12, 2016

It was the second shooting incident in the city in just over 24 hours, coming shortly after singer Christina Grimmie was shot dead late Friday (June 10) by a gunman who stormed a theater where she had just finished a gig.

Witnesses said the shooting erupted at around 2am local time (2pm Singapore time) amid throbbing music as the crowded club was nearing closing time.

Speaking to Sky News, clubber Ricardo Negron, who was inside when the shooting began, described how the gunman raked the club with bullets.

“People just dropped on the floor. I guess the shooter was shooting at the ceiling because you could see all the glass from the lamps falling,” he told the network.

He described hearing “non-stop firing” which probably lasted less than a minute but felt like a lot longer.

“There was a brief pause in the shooting and some of us just got up and ran out the back. People have definitely been injured – or worse.”

Emergency vehicles swarmed the area, with at least one crisis command vehicle at the scene.

“Shooting at Pulse Nightclub on S Orange. Multiple injuries. Stay away from area,” Orlando police wrote on Twitter.

“There are injuries. I am not sure if there are any deceased at this time,” a police dispatcher told AFP. “Officers are going in to search the building and to get people out.”

The club advertises itself online as “Orlando’s hottest gay bar.” On its Facebook page, the club warned patrons: “Everyone get out Pulse and keep running.”

Witness Christopher Hanson said he heard “loud banging noises, like gunshots going off.” “I didn’t see any of the actual shooters. I just saw bodies going down and I was ordering a drink at the bar.

“I fell down. I crawled out. People were trying to escape out the back. I just know that when I hit the ground, I was crawling and I hit my elbows and my knees,” he told CNN.

He said there was “blood everywhere.”

Rosie Feba was at the club with a friend when the shooting broke out.

“She told me someone was shooting. Everyone was getting on the floor,” Feba told the Orlando Sentinel. “I told her I didn’t think it was real, I thought it was just part of the music, until I saw fire coming out of his gun.”

The incident came on the heels of a deadly shooting at the nearby Plaza Live Theater in which a heavily-armed gunman shot and critically wounded singer Grimmie, a former contestant on the popular TV talent show The Voice.

She was rushed to hospital but died of her wounds. The theater is located less than four miles (6.4km) from Pulse nightclub.

The Plaza gunman, 27-year-old Kevin James Loibl, then killed himself.

He was found to be armed with armed with two handguns, ammunition and a hunting knife, police said. His motive remains unknown.

Gunman dead, about 20 killed in shooting at Florida gay nightclub: Police

Don't americans keep telling us that guns save lives?

The shooter was a paki k.unt aka muslim terrorist

Orlando toll rises to 50 dead...53 injured.....

Orlando nightclub shooting - BBC News

That's what happens when the public is not allowed to bring their guns into a night club, right?

Worst mass shooting in US history...

Must be more to it than the usual nutjob but these shootings are so common in the States that it hardly registers on the cripes almighty scale.

Originally Posted by stamford

The shooter was a paki k.unt aka muslim terrorist

Which means he would have had access to a weapon regardless of any gun control laws.

Would one be a conspiracy nut to think some murky government agency may have coached, brainwashed, wound up this nut and pointed him in the right direction just in time to help Clinton and her inevitable gun control platform?

Crazy place that Merka

Originally Posted by BobR

Would one be a conspiracy nut to think some murky government agency may have coached, brainwashed, wound up this nut and pointed him in the right direction just in time to help Clinton and her inevitable gun control platform?

yes

just another religious closet dweller with a projectile weapon

welcome the the future of seppo land

The shooter is believed to be a US citizen of Afghan heritage named as Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old man from Florida. Police say they have a “positive identification” of the shooter, but have not announced a name as they are still notifying the shooter’s family.

allah akhbar.

Funny that , no big internet outcry, on Facebook nobody's changed their profile pic to a rainbow.
Or is that out of fashion now

You mean nobody saying: "I am Gay " ?

Understand where holy shit comes from now.

Originally Posted by lom

That's what happens when the public is not allowed to bring their guns into a night club, right?

Yes, if they had all been armed, as is their right, all would have survived.

These silly people will never learn.

Originally Posted by baldrick

welcome the the future of seppo land

Future? This shit has been going on all along. It is the UK and Europe that will have it far worse in the future.

Originally Posted by baldrick

welcome the the future of seppo land

Over 50 dead and Baldrick finds a way to squeeze in an insult. Sick.

Originally Posted by BobR

Would one be a conspiracy nut to think some murky government agency may have coached, brainwashed, wound up this nut and pointed him in the right direction just in time to help Clinton and her inevitable gun control platform?

Fool.

Originally Posted by stamford

Don't americans keep telling us that guns save lives?

The shooter was a paki k.unt aka muslim terrorist

American, actually.

Originally Posted by wasabi

Funny that , no big internet outcry, on Facebook nobody's changed their profile pic to a rainbow.
Or is that out of fashion now

Less than 12 hours
..Sheesh give it some time.


RIP innocents.

Gunman in worst U.S. massacre described as 'quiet,' with few friends


Gunman in worst U.S. massacre described as 'quiet,' with few friends | Reuters

He probably wouldn't have been able to inflict so much damage with a knife, or even a single shot bolt or lever action rifle.

Originally Posted by kingwilly

Quote:
Originally Posted by BobR
Would one be a conspiracy nut to think some murky government agency may have coached, brainwashed, wound up this nut and pointed him in the right direction just in time to help Clinton and her inevitable gun control platform?
Fool.

sheep The problem with conspiracy theories now is that they make more sense than the "official" versions.

Originally Posted by bsnub

Originally Posted by baldrick

welcome the the future of seppo land

Future? This shit has been going on all along. It is the UK and Europe that will have it far worse in the future.

Yep, gun control has worked really well there.

Guns used in the Orlando shooting....


.223 calibre AR rifle


9mm semi-automatic pistol

via Twitter @ATFHQ

Gunman Omar Mateen: Father, security guard, Muslim extremist




Omar Mirseddique Mateen, the 29-year-old gunman accused of killing dozens of people in Orlando on Sunday, was a security guard, the divorced father of a 3-year-old and, in school, someone who acted "dorky."

He also was an extremist whose outspoken interest in terrorism twice put him on the FBI's radar screen.

On Sunday morning, he became something far larger: a lone gunman who authorities say was responsible for the deadliest mass shooting in American history.

He called 911 from outside a gay nightclub just south of downtown Orlando, pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, authorities said, then after exchanging gunfire with an Orlando police officer who was working as a bouncer, walked into the club and opened fire while the music blared.

By the time a police SWAT team stormed the building three hours later, they found 50 people dead or dying and 53 wounded. Mateen was one of those killed, and police said he died in a shootout with them.

He had been armed with two guns – a 9 mm semiautomatic pistol and a .223-caliber assault rifle — according to federal law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Mateen had purchased both in the past 12 days from a gun store not far from his home in St. Lucie County, 125 miles south of Orlando, federal officials said.

He grew up in Port St. Lucie. He had no prior arrests in Florida, according to state records.

Brice Miller went to Southport Middle School and St. Lucie West Centennial High School with Mateen and described him as non-violent and someone who was bullied.

"You could tell it hurt his feelings," Miller said, "but he would laugh it off."

"He was just dorky," Miller said. "He was disliked, but he always tried to get you to laugh."

Miller knew him as Omar Mir Seddique, but the gunman legally changed his name to Omar Mateen when he was 21.

It's not clear why.

Mateen was a security guard who had a license to carry a firearm, according to records at the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

According to CBS News, he worked for G4S, a private security firm based in Jupiter, and had been on its payroll since 2007.

"We are cooperating fully with all law enforcement authorities," according to a G4S statement cited by CBS. A spokeswoman for G4S was not available for comment.

Mateen first came to the attention of the FBI in 2013, said Central Florida Special Agent in Charge Ron Hopper.

He had made inflammatory remarks to co-workers and claimed to have terrorist ties, agents interviewed him and other witnesses, then closed the file after determining that he had broken no laws.

He came to the FBI's attention again the following year after he made contact with an American who later died in a suicide bombing in Syria, officials said. The agency closed that investigation, concluding that the contact was minimal.

During the rampage in Orlando, Mateen pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and made reference to the Tsarnaev brothers, the terrorists who set off a pair of homemade bombs at the 2013 Boston Marathon, according to the Massachusetts State Police.

Three people were killed and 264 were injured in that attack on April 15, 2013.

Mateen was believed to have been born in New York state to parents originally from Afghanistan, according to The Los Angeles Times.

On Sunday in Fort Pierce, authorities set up two mobile crime labs close to a two-story apartment building where Mateen is believed to have lived.

"We have lived here eight years, and it's crazy to think this could be someone living next door, somebody we would see at the grocery store," said Joanne Crosby, 48. "It could be that up until yesterday, he was a normal person."

About 10 miles away in Port St. Lucie a dozen police units set up a barrier to keep onlookers and reporters away from a building on Southwest Bayshore Boulevard, another address linked to Mateen.

Two months ago, his father, Seddique Mateen, set up a non-profit called 'Provisional Government of Afghanistan" in a nearby building.

His father also hosts a television show and in a segment available on YouTube, expressed "gratitude toward the Afghan Taliban and described Taliban fighters as "our brothers," according to The Washington Post.

On NBC News, Seddique Mateen apologized for the massacre, saying, "We are in shock like the whole country. This had nothing to do with religion."

He also said that his son recently got angry after seeing two men kissing in downtown Miami.

"They were kissing each other and touching each other, and he said, 'Look at that. In front of my son they are doing that.' … And then we were in the men's bathroom, and men were kissing each other."

In the past, the Islamic State has released video showing the execution of suspected homosexuals in its territory. Some were thrown from tall buildings.

The Post also interviewed Omar Mateen's ex-wife, who described him as violent and mentally unstable.

They met online. They were married in 2009 and divorced in 2011, records show.

"He beat me," said the woman, who asked that her name not be used. "He would just come home and start beating me up because the laundry wasn't finished or something like that."

Staff members Elyssa Cherney, Del Quentin Wilber, David Fleshler, Barbara Hijek, Paula McMahon, Mike Clary, Bob Drogin contributed to this report. rstutzman@tribpub.com or 407-650-6394 or jinman@tribpub.com or 407-420-5002

Copyright © 2016, Orlando Sentinel

RIP the victims.

Really need to get serious with ISIS.

Originally Posted by Maanaam

Really need to get serious with ISIS.

And guns.

Sounds like a lone nutter and probable closet homosexual. Removing easy access to guns is the only way to go.