BATON ROUGE — During a shooting that occurred inside the Mall of Louisiana that injured five and left one dead on Thursday, one Prairieville man working inside the mall decided to run and provide assistance to the victims.

"I was sitting at my bench working and I just heard what sounded like rapid gunfire, and having been a little bit in law enforcement, I knew the sound,” Michael Wilkinson said.

Wilkinson, a former first responder who served for around 30 years as a firefighter, rushed towards where the shooting had occurred.

When he arrived at the scene, he began looking for ways to help. He then noticed multiple victims.

“The first one I saw was on my right side, lying down, and it was only like a leg wound. It wasn't that severe. Off to my left, I saw the other girl who was seriously wounded and I didn't feel there was any threat as far as gunfire at that point. I kind of went into a medic role at that time. I saw she had a very, very faint pulse and started CPR. Opened her airway and started CPR,” Wilkinson said.

About a minute into applying CPR, first responders arrived on scene to help.

WBRZ asked Wilkinson if he had been in that type of situation before.

“Not really in that kind of situation. I've been into some very scary situations riding the fire truck and also on the hazmat unit, but nothing to that degree,” Wilkinson said.

Wilkinson said he is praying for the victims and said he is always ready to help if a situation like that occurs.

"Like I told my wife, I said if it happened again tomorrow, I would do the same thing,” Wilkinson said.