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A popular sentiment that has been steadily popping up on my Facebook feeds is that Omar Mateen, the shooter in the mass shooting in Orlando, had visited the gay nightclub many times previously:

Witnesses said they believe they saw the Orlando shooting gunman "at least a dozen times" at the gay nightclub before he fatally shot 49 people, Orlando Sentinel reported Monday. Police said they have no information about those visits.

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/world/orlando-gunman-omar-mateen-had-used-gay-dating-app-visited-pulse-nightclub-witnesses-say-20160614-gpieye.html

Did Omar Mateen hang out at gay bars and use a gay dating app?

yuritsuki
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    Right now this has to be a "We don't know yet, but probably". [The FBI are investigating it](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/14/orlando-shooting-omar-mateen-motive-pulse-nightclub). That article [and this one](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/14/orlando-shooter-omar-mateen-was-a-regular-at-nightclub) give many quotes from gay men in the area saying he'd been a regular at that bar and on gay dating apps for years (not just the run-up to the attack), and his (ex) wife considered it a possibility – user56reinstatemonica8 Jun 14 '16 at 22:56
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    All: this claim (and thus this question) is about actions, not the internal state of mind, motivations, or sexual preferences of this person. –  Jun 14 '16 at 23:12
  • http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/14/orlando-shooting-omar-mateen-motive-pulse-nightclub – vartec Jun 14 '16 at 23:12
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    The evidence we've seen so far certainly suggests that this is true. What kind of answer are you looking for? If you question the people who have said this, or the press accounts of their statements, then what kind of evidence would you accept? What would be convincing evidence that he did not? – Mark Jun 15 '16 at 00:28
  • "Five people who have been to the Pulse nightclub, where a gunman killed 49 people, have told the Sentinel that they had seen Omar Mateen there before, and that they interacted with him on gay dating apps." http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/pulse-orlando-nightclub-shooting/os-adam4adam-omar-mateen-info-20160615-story.html – DavePhD Jun 16 '16 at 17:21
  • http://www.cbsnews.com/news/orlando-shooting-man-who-says-he-was-omar-mateen-gay-lover-speaks-out-univision/ – DavePhD Jul 21 '16 at 15:06
  • Not a provable answer, but my friend who is in that scene said that he'd seen the guy on the DL at a bunch of gay spots in Orlando, and right before the shooting there was a rumor that someone he had met on Grindr had given him HIV. – Tam Hartman Oct 31 '16 at 17:53

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