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AUSTIN, Texas – Law enforcement authorities had a sufficient number of personnel at the scene of the Uvalde school massacre to have stopped the gunman three minutes after he entered the building, according to an analysis of the response. Moreover, they never checked a classroom door to see if it was locked, Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw testified Tuesday, denouncing the police response an “abject failure.”
McCraw testified Tuesday morning at a Texas State Senate hearing. The DPS director was critical of Uvalde CISD Police Chief Pete Arredondo’s response to the mass shooting on May 24 at Robb Elementary in the small community, ABC 7 Amarillo reported.
“There’s compelling evidence that the law enforcement response to the attack at Robb Elementary was an abject failure and antithetical to everything we’ve learned over the last two decades since the Columbine massacre,” McCraw said.
Responding officers waited for more than an hour before they stormed the classroom and killed the gunman, who had already murdered two teachers and 19 children.
As it turned out, the classroom door could not be locked from the inside. Sadly, there is no indication that anyone checked to see if it would open. Instead, they waited for a key, Col. McGraw said.
“I have great reasons to believe it was never secured,” McCraw said of the door. ”How about trying the door and seeing if it’s locked?”
Delays in the law enforcement response have become the focus of federal, state and local investigations.
“Obviously, not enough training was done in this situation, plain and simple. Because terrible decisions were made by the on-site commander,” McCraw said of Arredondo, the Uvalde school district police chief.
McCraw said it is unacceptable that it took 74 minutes for the officers to enter Rooms 111 and 112 and engage the shooter, according to the news outlet.
“The officers had weapons, the children had none. The officers had body armor, the children had none. The officers had training, the subject had none. One hour and 14 minutes and eight seconds. That’s how long the children waited, and the teachers waiting in Room 111 to be rescued. And while they waited, the on-scene commander waited for radio and rifles. And he waited for shields and he waited for SWAT. Lastly, he waited for a key that was never needed,” McCraw testified.
The director outlined the sequence of events for the committee as well as a series of missed opportunities, communication breakdowns and other mistakes, which included:
- An officer reported they had a “hooligan” pry tool eight minutes after the suspect entered the building.
- The first ballistic shield arrived on scene 19 minutes after the gunman entered the building.
- Arredondo did not have a radio with him.
- Police and sheriff’s radios did not work within the school; only the radios of Border Patrol agents on the scene worked inside the school, and even they did not work perfectly.
- Some diagrams of the school that police were using to coordinate their response were wrong.
McGraw said the gunman entered the school through an exterior door that could not be locked from the inside. A teacher had closed the door and it could only be locked from the outside.
“There’s no way for her to know the door is locked” McCraw said. “He walked straight through.”
“Three minutes after the subject entered the west building, there was a sufficient number of armed officers wearing body armor to isolate, distract and neutralize the subject. The only thing stopping a hallway of dedicated officers from entering Room 111 and 112 was the on-scene commander, who decided to place the lives of officers before the lives of children,” McCraw testified.
Weeks after the massacre, Arredondo said he didn’t consider himself the incident commander, Law Officer reported.
His woeful admission demonstrates how unprepared he was to be in this position.
Regarding the amount of time it took before law enforcement personnel entered the classroom, McCraw said, “In an active shooter environment, that’s intolerable.”
“This set our profession back a decade. That’s what it did,” he said as it relates to the police response in Uvalde, ABC 7 reported.
Despite misinformation filtering out for days and weeks following the mass murders, McCraw assured lawmakers, “Everything I’ve testified today is corroborated.”
McGraw said there is a need for more training, and emphasized that a “go-bag” should be put in every state patrol car in Texas, including a shield and door-breaching equipment.
“I want every trooper to know how to breach and have the tools to do it,” he said.
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