MGM: Las Vegas security guard is not missing
Mandalay Bay's parent company says Jesus Campos doesn't want media attention right now.
The Mandalay Bay security guard who slipped out of the public spotlight in the aftermath of the Las Vegas shooting is not a missing person, police told Fox News on Tuesday, amid continuing questions about his whereabouts.
Jesus Campos was scheduled for a series of television interviews last week, including one with Fox News' Sean Hannity, but the guard vanished in the hours beforehand, without telling his union president where he was heading.
Jesus Campos hasn't been heard from since he was set to give a series of interviews last week.
“He is a victim in this and we don’t discuss victims,” Las Vegas Police Officer and Spokesman Larry Hadfield told Fox News on Tuesday.
Hadfield said the department is not planning on holding any future press conferences, absent the development of new details.
MGM Resorts International, the hotel's parent company, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal: “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.” The newspaper suggested that based on that statement, MGM seems to know Campos' whereabouts.
David Hickey, president of the Security, Police, and Fire Professionals of America union, which represents Campos, said on Monday it had been four days since he last saw Campos.
“We have had no contact with him... Clearly, somebody knows where he is," Hickey told the Los Angeles Times.
The union leader on Friday told reporters he received a text Campos was visiting a walk-in health clinic in the Las Vegas metropolitan area.
"For the past four days he's been preparing," Hickey told reporters Friday, FOX5 Las Vegas reported. "We had a meeting with MGM officials, and after that meeting was over, we talked about the interviews, we went to a private area, and when we came out, Mr. Campos was gone."
But as of Tuesday, the clinic told Fox News it had no updates on a possible visit from him. On Monday, a spokeswoman said she had “heard nothing” about Campos stopping by.
Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said Campos was investigating an alarm for a door that had been left ajar on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino when he was shot by gunman Stephen Paddock on Oct. 1. Campos then alerted hotel security about the ongoing scene, police said.
However, a former guard who worked for the property in the early 2000s cast doubt on Lombardo’s statement Monday, telling the Los Angeles Times no such security system existed during his employment there.
“There was no alarm system for opened doors when I was there,” he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “You know how often people would have to call hotel guests if that was the case?”
One of Campos’ co-workers who spoke to the newspaper hopes Campos – who she called “humble and so charming” -- emerges soon so he can be honored for his actions on the night of the shooting.
“He was always in the middle of what was going down,” the co-worker said, who also spoke on condition of anonymity.
On Sunday, a man who said he had been hired to guard Campos' house in northern Las Vegas told the Los Angeles Times he was there to prevent news media from snooping around on the property, but did not reveal who asked him to do the job.
“No media on property” read one sign near the home.
Neighbors around the single story building where Campos reportedly lived, with a pool in the backyard, said the Mandalay Bay guard mostly kept to himself.
"He's a hero,” Jaime Ruano told the Los Angeles Times, “and nobody knows where he is.”
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