A man who sold 720 rounds of ammunition to the gunman who carried out the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history has been charged with manufacturing armour-piercing bullets.
Two unfired armour-piercing bullets, carrying the fingerprints of ammunition dealer Douglas Haig, were found inside the Las Vegas hotel room where Stephen Paddock shot 58 people dead on October 1 last year, court documents filed in Phoenix say.
The documents say Haig was not licensed to manufacture this type of ammunition, nor do they specify if the bullets he supplied were used by Paddock in the attack.
Haig was charged with manufacturing the armour-piercing bullets after holding a news conference on Friday in which he said there was nothing suspicious about Paddock when he sold him ammunition in the weeks before the massacre.
"I had no contribution to what Paddock did," Haig told reporters on Friday, adding that there was nothing unusual about the type or quantity of ammunition the shooter bought.
"I had no way to see into his mind."
A call to Haig's lawyer Marc Victor wasn't immediately returned.
The court documents say the two armour-piercing bullets found inside the Mandalay Bay suite had an "incendiary capsule" on their noses. An analysis of the bullets showed they had tool marks consistent with equipment found in Haig's backyard.
Haig, a 55-year-old aerospace engineer who has sold ammunition as a hobby for about 25 years, said he met Paddock at a Phoenix gun show in the weeks before the shooting and that he was well-dressed and polite.
Haig's lawyer said they held the news conference to protect his reputation after he was revealed earlier this week to be a "person of interest" in the investigation. Haig's identity emerged by mistake after his name was not redacted in court documents.
