Pulse Nightclub Shooter Wrote A 'Manifesto' On Those Who Wronged Him For Law Enforcement Academy Application

The gunman who murdered dozens of people at Orlando's Pulse Nightclub in 2016 in one of the country’s deadliest mass shootings wrote an eight-page “manifesto” detailing those who wronged him in his application to a police training program, according to the instructor who rejected his application, who added that the mass killer threatened him and his family after the flat-out rejection from the program.

Omar Mateen, who murdered 49 people and injured more than 50 others before being killed by police at the Orlando club on June 12, 2016, was quickly denied admission to the Treasure Coast Public Safety Training Complex at Indian River State College in 2015. Pierre Pacheco, a background investigator and instructor for the law enforcement academy detailed the meeting to the audience at CrimeCom, presented by Oxygen, on Sunday morning while discussing the red flags Mateen presented before his deadly rampage at the gay nightclub.

“Instead of handing me his application, he hands me a manifesto,” Pacheco told the crowd in Austin. “It is eight pages of every individual who, he claims, has done him wrong in his life — by name. If they were officers, by what department, what their current rank was, and what office they worked in.”

Pacheco went on to describe the interview process, saying that Mateen was “peacocking” to seem tough at first and was clearly not telling the truth. He told Mateen to come back for a follow-up interview, he said, at which point Mateeen’s demeanor was more affable — until Pacheco began to question his responses, and it became clear he wasn’t going to be admitted into the academy. 

Kimberlie Massnick and Pierre Pacheo. Photo: CrimeCon/Oxygen

“He's just thinking that he's going to pressure his way into the system,” Pacheco told the crowd. 

In a follow-up phone call, Mateen demanded that Pacheco and his boss immediately resign from their jobs, he recalled. He said that Mateen, at that point, also threatened him and his family. 

“He goes, ‘Congratulations on that new baby. Must be nice for you and your wife.’ He goes ‘Because I just want to let you know that I know how to handle things when things don't go my way,’” Pacheco told the audience.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the FBI were informed by officials at the college that Mateen should be placed under surveillance, he said. 

On Sunday, Pacheco also recalled how a year after Mateeen’s application was rejected, he turned up in the school parking lot, carrying a backpack. 

“To be brutally honest with you — we assumed that he was going to be waiting in the parking lot for us to kill us. And we would go out in packs, and we would survey the parking lot to ensure that he wasn't there for the first few months after that happened,” Pacheco said. 

It seems that their instincts were correct. 

“Exactly one year from the day that I gave him a denial to the Law Enforcement Academy, he was in our parking lot. On the same day, “ Pacheco said, adding that Mateen never made it into the building and soon disappeared after someone noticed he was on the property.

Pacheco and Dr. Kimberlie Massnick, who co-host the “Murders and Mysteries with Massnick Podcast” were on the stage in Austin together to discuss red flags seen in Mateen's behavior, both throughout his early years and while he was a student at Indian River State College, where they both worked. He was a student in the mid-2000s, attending the Indian River State College's Criminal Justice Training program.