The father of Las Vegas gunman Stephen Paddock was reportedly a self-ordained minister who carried out marriage ceremonies and wanted to start his own church as well as being on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list of fugitives.

In the search to understand the psychology of the mass murderer, attention has focused on the colourful criminal life of his father Benjamin Hoskins Paddock.

Although the killer had no previous criminal convictions and apparently lived in the shadows of society, rarely speaking to his neighbours, his father was a larger than life character, according to reports.

Paddock Senior spent almost a decade on the run after he was sprung from a Texan prison in 1968, with an FBI poster describing him as a “psychopath” who should be treated as “armed and very dangerous”.

Unlike his son, Paddock Senior began his criminal life early, and was first arrested in 1946 aged just 19 for stealing 12 cars, according to a Chicago Tribune story at the time.

After spending time in prison, he went on to commit a series of bank robberies in Phoenix, Arizona, before being caught and jailed again.

He was removed from the wanted list in 1977 after almost a decade evading the law, and found a year later in Oregon where he had been running a bingo parlour.

He was charged with running an illegal gambling operation after he apparently exploited a loophole in the law which allowed him to pocket the proceeds of the parlour. Despite the charges he avoided a prison sentence.

In 1989, he tried to found a church in Las Vegas – apparently to sponsor the bingo parlour which he had started up again.

“He wanted to [locate the church in] Nevada because he liked to go there and gamble”, said Bernie Sue Warthen, a 67-year-old woman from Oregon who told reporters she became friends with Paddock Senior when he was in his 60s because she and his girlfriend both had teenage daughters who were friends.

Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Show all 15 1 /15 Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Las Vegas shooting – in pictures People scramble for shelter at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival after gun fire was heard Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures People carry a person at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival after shots were fired David Becker/Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures People run from the Route 91 Harvest country music festival after gun fire was heard David Becker/Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures A handout photo released via Twitter by Eiki Hrafnsson (@EirikurH) showing concertgoers running away from the scene (C) after shots range out at the Route 91 Harvest festival on Las Vegas Boulevard EPA/Eiki Hrafnsson Las Vegas shooting – in pictures People lie on the ground at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival after hearing gun fire Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures A man in a wheelchair is taken away from the Route 91 Harvest country music festival after hearing gun fire David Becker/Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures People stand on the street outside the Mandalay Bay hotel near the scene of the Route 91 Harvest festival on Las Vegas Boulevard EPA/Paul Buck Las Vegas shooting – in pictures FBI agents confer in front of the Tropicana hotel-casino after a mass shooting during a music festival on the Las Vegas Strip Reuters/Las Vegas Sun/Steve Marcus Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Las Vegas police run by a banner on the fence at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival grounds after shots were fired David Becker/Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures An injured person is tended to in the intersection of Tropicana Ave. and Las Vegas Boulevard after a mass shooting at a country music festival Ethan Miller/Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Metro Police officers pass by the front of the Tropicana hotel-casino after a mass shooting at a music festival on the Las Vegas Strip Reuters/Las Vegas Sun/Steve Marcus Las Vegas shooting – in pictures A woman sits on a curb at the scene of a shooting outside of a music festival along the Las Vegas Strip AP/John Locher Las Vegas shooting – in pictures A cowboy hat lays in the street after shots were fired near a country music festival in Las Vegas Getty Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Las Vegas Metro Police and medical workers stage in the intersection of Tropicana Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard South after a mass shooting at a music festival on the Las Vegas Strip Reuters/Las Vegas Sun/Steve Marcus Las Vegas shooting – in pictures Sheriff Joe Lombardo (2-R) speaking during a press briefing in the aftermath of the active shooter incident on Las Vegas Boulevard EPA

Speaking to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, she said Paddock Senior, an avid gambler, invited her to Las Vegas where they founded the Holy Life Congregation Church. She is listed as having been the Church’s secretary.

Although the Church never got off the ground, Paddock Senior began representing himself as a self-ordained minister in Las Vegas and married couples in the late 1980s.

The media as well as law enforcement agencies are continuing to pour over every detail of the gunman’s past and in a bid to understand what motivated him to open fire from his Mandalay Bay hotel room onto a country music festival, killing 58 people and injuring hundreds more before killing himself.

Although the killer spent only a few years around his father, who died in 1998, the two are said to have shared a mutual love of both gambling and Vegas, as well as guns.

Stephen Paddock’s 57-year-old brother Bruce Paddock also has a criminal past, although none of his convictions are for serious offences.

Records show Bruce was convicted for minor acts of vandalism, driving with a revoked licence and probation violations, as well as drug and driving offences.

University of Nebraska associate criminology professor Joseph Schwartz, who studies genetic links to criminal activity, warned against making easy assumptions based on Paddock Senior’s history and reports of his other son’s anti-social behaviour.

“It’s human nature to try to speculate and try to understand something so terrible,” he said. “In reality, (mistreating someone) is not a precursor to collecting multiple semi-automatic weapons and shooting at people from a hotel window.”

Paddock Senior died in 1998 and is understood to have had little contact with either of his two sons.

“The only one time I asked him about his children, he said he had nothing to do with them at their request,” Ms Warthen said. “I didn’t know their names. I just saw a picture.”

“The only man I knew was kind and generous,” she said.