Father of Las Vegas shooter lived in Chicago, where he did time and started a family

By Katherine Rosenberg-Douglas, Chicago Tribune (TNS)

Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2017 | 2 a.m.

Benjamin Paddock Jr. rang up quite a reputation in his life, some of it even real: Survivor of a World War II sinking, professional wrestler, car thief, confidence man, bank robber and one of the FBI's Most Wanted.

But the former Chicagoan had been dead almost 20 years by the time he gained his most disturbing distinction: The father of a mass murderer who killed 59 people and wounded more than 500 others during a country music festival in Las Vegas early Monday.

Nevada authorities have said they believe Stephen Paddock, 64, was the lone gunman in the deadliest mass shooting in recent U.S. history.

His father was a career criminal who spent some of his teenage years in Chicago, where he first started getting into trouble with the law, eventually doing two stints in Illinois state prisons, according to historian Travis Gross.

"There were records of him attending high school in Chicago," said Gross, executive director of the historical society in Sheboygan, where the elder Paddock was born. "By the time he was in his early 20s, it looked like he was already into a life of crime."

An article in the Chicago Tribune from Jan. 8, 1946, reports that Ben Paddock, 25, had "confessed stealing 12 automobiles in the last 18 months and selling them for an average of $1,200 each." At the time, Paddock was living in the 4900 block of North Tripp Avenue on the Northwest Side.

The article referred to Paddock as a merchant marine seaman, but Gross said he couldn't confirm whether Paddock actually served in the Navy or had been a merchant marine.

"What we did find, and this was particularly patriotic, was that his dad at age 60 joined the Quartermaster Corps, which is not like active duty where he'd be on the front lines ... but he wanted to serve his country and be a part of the war effort," Gross said.

Benjamin Paddock apparently took advantage of his father's service. The 1946 Tribune article notes that Paddock "obtained fraudulent bills of sale by writing to the secretary of state on stolen Army Quartermaster Corps stationery. His letters purported to give Army authorization of a title to a fictitious purchaser of an Army car."

Gross wonders whether Benjamin Paddock was linked to a crime ring during the early 1950s. "From the crimes that we saw that Benjamin Paddock was arrested for, it kind of seems like he might've gotten caught up in some of the crime syndicates in Chicago."

It was an FBI Most Wanted poster, sent to him by his "armchair historian" nephew hours after the shooting, that got Gross' organization looking into the connection between the small town in Wisconsin and the Las Vegas tragedy.

The poster, dated March 18, 1969, and signed by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, was issued after the senior Paddock escaped a Texas prison where he was serving time for bank robbery. Paddock was among the agency's most wanted for nearly a decade, Gross said.

"On the most wanted poster, it said he was arrested for car thefts and confidence games," Gross said. "That's something that the crime syndicates were involved in. He also had some nicknames, that kind of thing that makes it seem like he's part of a bigger racket, a bigger crime ring."

It listed Benjamin Paddock's birthplace as Sheboygan, but Gross said his research suggests the family had moved out of town as early as Benjamin's third birthday. Benjamin Paddock's mother -- Stephen Paddock's grandmother -- was part of a prominent family in Sheboygan, Gross said.

"His mother's side of the family was a relatively well-known family up here in Sheboygan because of their involvement in the maritime trade. (Olga Paddock's) father was a prominent ship captain in the Great Lakes around the turn of the 20th century."

Paddock married Stephen's mother, started a family and had moved to the Southwest by the mid-1950s, according to news reports.

There, he sought work with the Pima County Sheriff's Department, offering to use the mistakes he'd made in his youth to help see youngsters stay "on the straight and narrow," Sheriff Waldon Burr told the Tucson Daily Citizen.

But soon there were bank robberies, and Paddock was suspected of pulling them off. On July 28, 1960, federal authorities arrived at the family home in the 1100 block of North Camino Miraflores and questioned Delores Paddock, the Tucson paper reported.

A neighbor named Eva Price took the couple's 7-year-old son Stephen swimming, while a friend from Chicago, Mary Jacobs, cared for the three younger boys, Patrick, Bruce and Eric. Benjamin Paddock was arrested and held in Las Vegas on $25,000 bail.

"We're trying to keep Steve from knowing his dad is being held as a bank robber," Price told the newspaper. "I hardly know the family, but Steve is a nice boy."

The sheriff said the arrest was "quite a surprise" because the department "gave Paddock the usual FBI checkup when he joined us as an unpaid special deputy."

In the evening edition of the newspaper the day of the raid, under the headline, "Little children underfoot as FBI agents move in," Jacobs is mentioned as "a friend of the Paddocks who has been living with them since she came to Tucson from Chicago in March."

Jacobs said she had known the Paddocks when they lived in Chicago for two years and before the Paddocks left for Tucson in 1956.

Eva Price was quoted in that day's story as well, which mentioned Benjamin Paddock was suspected of four bank robberies in Phoenix since 1959. "What a terrible tragedy for the children," she said.

The Register-Guard, a newspaper in Eugene, Ore., picked up Paddock's life story in the 1970s. Paddock opened a bingo parlor in Springfield in 1977, while still on the run from the FBI. He was going by the alias "Bruce Eriksen," which became "Bingo Bruce."

A 1998 obituary for Bingo Bruce explored some of the tall tales surrounding Benjamin Paddock.

"Bingo Bruce Ericksen moved to Texas. His supposed cancer disappeared, and he lived a supposedly con-free life for another decade. He died there last month at 77. Supposedly. In addition to illegal activities, he claimed that he'd been a Dixieland band singer, pilot, auto racing crew chief, Chicago Bears pro football player, survivor of the World War II mine sweeper sinking and a wrestler named 'Crybaby' ... some of that may have been true. With Bruce, you never knew. He was born Benjamin Hoskins Paddock II. Supposedly."