The Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino security guard shot by Las Vegas gunman Stephen Paddock has finally broken his silence, after briefly going missing just ahead of scheduled media interviews on Thursday.
Jesus Campos will appear on The Ellen Degeneres Show Wednesday afternoon, and NBC has released a preview clip of the interview. In it, Campos described the moment he first heard shots on the 32nd floor of the hotel, where he had responded to an alarm indicating an open hotel room door.
“As I was walking down, I heard rapid fire. And at first I took cover, I felt a burning sensation. I went to go lift my pant leg up and I saw the blood,” Campos says in the clip.
Moments later, Paddock is believed to have opened fire on a crowd gathered at a country music festival, shooting at the concertgoers from a broken window in his hotel room. The deadly massacre killed 58 people and injured hundreds more. It is the deadliest shooting in the country’s history.
As CrimeOnline previously reported, Campos was scheduled to appear for multiple media interviews on Thursday, but instead left a hotel where he had been preparing with his de-facto spokesperson, David Hickey, president of the Security, Police, and Fire Professionals of America (SPFPA). Hickey told CrimeOnline that he had left Campos in a room with another security official, and when he returned 20 minutes later, Campos was gone.
Hickey was later told that the security official and Campos had gone to a walk-in medical clinic, but that he did not know why. The union president said as of Monday that he had not heard anymore from or about Campos, and had no idea where he was. He also added that the interviews were originally Campos’s idea.
On Tuesday, MGM Resorts International, which operates Mandalay Bay, released the following statement:
Jesus Campos wants to tell his story at a time and place of his choosing. He’s asked that everyone respect his request for privacy. We could not be more proud of Jesus.
MGM Resorts International did not respond to a follow-up inquiry about the statement, and Hickey did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.
According to a Today show report, this will be Campos’s only interview. Ellen Degeneres reportedly said that Campos and Stephen Schuck, the Mandalay Bay maintenance engineer who appeared alongside him on the show, both refused payment for the appearance.
[Feature photo: Today show screenshot]
