US President Donald Trump has announced a ban on the sale and possession of the “bump stock” device that made Las Vegas killer Stephen Paddock’s October rampage far more deadly, just as chilling new images of the shooter have been published.

The CCTV pictures taken from inside the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino — where Paddock was staying — show the 64 year old checking in to the hotel on September 25 and moving through the gambling areas of the casino on October 1 — the same day that he launched his deadly assault which killed 58 people and injured (directly or indirectly) over 800 others.

Other images released show Paddock moving suitcases up to his hotel room.

Paddock’s massacre prompted calls for the banning of the bump stocks he used — devices that allow semiautomatic weapons to fire like a machinegun.

And six months on, the US Justice Department is proposing rule changes that will effectively ban their sale or possession.

“After the senseless attack in Las Vegas, this proposed rule is a critical step in our effort to reduce the threat of gun violence that is in keeping with the Constitution and the laws passed by Congress,” US Attorney-General Jeff Sessions said in a statement on Friday.

Sessions has been a defender of the US Constitution’s Second Amendment, which protects the right to bear arms.

Gunman Stephen Paddock used a bump stock in a massacre last October that killed 58 people and wounded hundreds of others at a music festival in Las Vegas.

Authorities said Paddock’s ability to fire hundreds of rounds per minute over a 10-minute period from his 32nd-floor hotel suite was a major factor in the high casualty count.

In February, President Donald Trump signed a memorandum directing the Justice Department to make the regulatory change.

The National Rifle Association, the most powerful US gun lobby, supported more regulation of bump stocks but has not endorsed Trump’s ban, and said previously it was awaiting the publication of the regulation before rendering judgment.

The Justice Department announcement comes as hundreds of thousands of Americans are expected to rally nationwide on Saturday for tighter gun laws in March For Our Lives protests led by survivors of the Florida school massacre, which reignited the debate over Americans’ access to guns.

Students from the Parkland, Florida, high school where 17 students and staff were killed on February 14 will be among the 500,000 people who organisers say could rally on Pennsylvania Avenue near the Capitol in Washington.