UVALDE, Texas, May 28 (Reuters) – Texas investigators were trying to determine on Saturday how critical mistakes were made in the response to the deadly shooting in Uvalde, including why nearly 20 police officers were left out. an elementary school classroom while the children panicked at 911. ask for help.
The reason why officers waited in the hallway for nearly an hour before entering and shooting dead the gunman is the focus of an ongoing investigation by the Texas Department of Homeland Security into the massacre of 19 children and two teachers in the shooting. deadliest American school in nearly a decade.
Investigators are also continuing to look for the motive for the attack. Salvador Ramos, who dropped out of high school, had no criminal record or a history of mental illness.
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At least two children made 911 calls from a couple of adjoining classrooms after Ramos, 18, entered an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle on Tuesday, said Colonel Steven McCraw, director of the Department of Homeland Security. of Texas. earlier this week.
“She’s in Room 112,” a girl whispered on the phone at 12:03 p.m., more than 45 minutes before a U.S. Border Patrol-led tactical team entered at 12:51 p.m. and ended the siege. at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde. , a village of 16,000 inhabitants west of Sant Antoni.
The same girl had asked the 911 operator to “please send the police now” at 12:43 and again four minutes later.
The site’s commander, the head of the school district’s police department, believed at the time that Ramos was barricaded inside and that the children were no longer at immediate risk, giving officers time to prepare, McCraw said.
“From the benefit of the retrospective where I’m sitting now, of course, it wasn’t the right decision,” McCraw said. “It was a wrong decision, period.”
Standard law enforcement protocols require police to deal with an active school shooter without delay, rather than waiting for a backup or more firepower, a point McCraw acknowledged.
McCraw described other times when Ramos may have been frustrated. A school official, responding to calls about a gunman who crashed into a car at the funeral home across the street, passed Ramos as he crouched beside a vehicle on the property. of the school. Police said Ramos shot two people outside before climbing a fence on the school grounds.
The door that gave Ramos access to the building had been left open by a teacher, McCraw said, in violation of school district safety policies.
As criticism of the law enforcement response increased, police officers from cities as far away as Houston and Dallas began to reach Uvalde to help support local authorities, in some cases providing protection to the UValde police, the mayor and the gun shop where Ramos bought. its arsenal.
Police cruisers were parked in front of the home of Pedro Arredondo, the school district police chief. The police response to the shooting has been harshly criticized by McCraw and Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott, among others.
Questions about police efforts to stop Ramos arose when the main U.S. arms rights group, the National Rifle Association, held its annual convention 443 km (275 miles) away in Houston. .
Abbott, a Republican and staunch gun advocate who addressed the meeting in a pre-recorded video, seized on apparent police errors in Uvalde, and said at a subsequent press conference that he was deceived and ” livid for what happened “.
Abbott denied that recently enacted Texas gun laws, including a controversial measure that removed license requirements for carrying a concealed weapon, had “no relevance” to Tuesday’s bloodshed. He suggested that state lawmakers focus renewed attention on addressing mental illness.
President Joe Biden, a Democrat who has urged Congress to pass new arms restrictions, will visit Uvalde on Sunday to comfort families and show respect for young victims. Read more
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Report by Brad Brooks and Gabriella Borter; Written by Nathan Layne; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Daniel Wallis
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