Other common sense gun laws might have stopped him.
Michel, who owns Dixie GunWorx, tells NPR's Lulu Garcia-Navarro that he remembers Paddock coming into his store on three occasions earlier this year. Michel says he spends a lot of time talking with his customers, so he can screen them. To him, Paddock didn't seem suspicious or off in any way. So Michel sold him a gun.
Now in the aftermath of the mass shooting, Michel is doing some soul-searching. He discusses with Lulu all that has been going through his mind since he heard the identity of the shooter.
The biggest thing ... for me, specifically because I was the one that ended up doing the final sale to him is: Did I miss anything? Did I miss a red flag? Is there some way that I could have prevented this? Was the firearm that we sold him used? Could I have stopped this? ... All those kinds of questions kind of go through your head and in the end, the answer is no. He was a perfectly legitimate customer that asked not the perfect questions, but the right questions to get rid of red flags.
....I am also somebody that doesn't believe the average everyday citizen should own a machine gun.
I'm not saying that I can understand it because my point of view is a little different. I definitely get where they're coming from and the fear that it can bring. And so I definitely can see that side of it. I don't believe we need more regulation in the United States. I think that there's thousands upon thousands of firearm laws that are on the books right now. I do believe though 100 percent that we should have more enforcement of these laws. ... The enforcement side of it, I think, in my opinion, would be a way of ruining or stopping some of these plans that are made by bad people.