A security officer who was shot trying to stop Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock at the Mandalay Bay hotel on Oct. 1 appeared in a pre-recorded interview on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" on Wednesday, following reports that he had gone missing.
Jesus Campos told Ellen DeGeneres that he made his way up to the 32nd floor of the hotel as Paddock fired into a crowd of 2,000 concertgoers attending the Route 91 Harvest Festival. When he arrived at the floor, he saw that the doors to the stairwell were locked, which caused him to call the engineering team.
“I’m walking down [the hallway] and I believe that’s what caught the shooter’s attention,” he said. “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. That’s when I called it in on my radio, that shots had been fired.”
Paddock reportedly shot Campos through the door of his suite, where hotel engineer Stephen Schuck found him. Schuck also appeared on “Ellen” alongside Campos.
“I saw Jesus, and I started to hear shooting. At the time I didn’t know it was shooting; I thought it was a jackhammer,” Schuck said. “That’s when Jesus, he leaned out, and he said, ‘Take cover! Take cover!’ Yelled at me, and within milliseconds, if he didn’t say that, I would’ve got hit.”
Schuck said that Paddock also started shooting at him through the door and that he felt “pressure” as the bullets passed his head.
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DeGeneres applauded Campos for being a “hero” and saving so many lives.
“I know that you have had so many people asking you to tell the story, and I know you have had so much reluctance, and you want this to be over,” DeGeneres said. “It’s helpful for people to understand what a hero you are, because you, being shot in the leg, saved so many people’s lives, and instead of you just getting out of there, you saved Stephen’s life and that woman’s life and who knows how many other people.”
Campos stayed behind to help police piece together the incident instead of seeking treatment at the hospital.
Now, Campos told the host that he is “doing better each day. Slowly but surely, just healing physically and mentally.”
Both men politely declined DeGeneres’ usual gift of money, but the host couldn’t let these two heroes walk away empty-handed. Schuck was gifted Colts tickets and VIP treatment to meet the team by the NFL, while Campos was thanked with a gift of season tickets to the Oakland Raiders and a $25,000 donation to the victims of the shooting.
Campos disappeared from the public eye just last week after suddenly canceling interviews on Fox News, CNN, ABC, CBS and NBC.
The company that owns Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino said that Campos “wants to tell his story at a time and place of his choosing.”
"He's asked that everyone respect his request for privacy," the company said in a statement. "We could not be more proud of Jesus."
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