‘Very angry’: Uvalde locals grapple with faculty chief’s function

UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The blame for an excruciating delay in killing the gunman at a Texas elementary college — at the same time as mother and father outdoors begged police to rush in and panicked youngsters known as 911 from inside — has been positioned with the varsity district’s homegrown police chief.

It’s left residents in the small metropolis of Uvalde struggling to reconcile what they know of the well-liked local lawman after the director of state police stated that the commander at the scene — Pete Arredondo — made the “flawed decision” last week not to breach a classroom at Robb Elementary College sooner, believing the gunman was barricaded inside and children weren’t at risk.

Steven McCraw, the top of the Texas Department of Public Security, stated on the Friday news convention that after following the gunman into the constructing, officers waited over an hour to breach the classroom. Nineteen children and two teachers have been killed in the shooting.

Arredondo, who grew up in Uvalde and graduated from highschool right here, was set to be sworn in Tuesday to his new spot on the City Council after being elected earlier this month, but Mayor Don McLaughlin said in a press release Monday that the assembly wouldn’t happen. It wasn’t immediately clear whether or not the swearing-in would occur privately or at a later date.

“Pete Arredondo was duly elected to the Metropolis Council,” McLaughlin said in the statement. “There is nothing within the Metropolis Constitution, Election Code, or Texas Constitution that prohibits him from taking the oath of workplace.”

The 50-year-old Arredondo has spent much of a nearly 30-year profession in regulation enforcement in Uvalde, returning in 2020 to take the pinnacle police job on the school district.

When Arredondo was a boy, Maria Gonzalez used to drive him and her youngsters to the same college where the taking pictures occurred. “He was a good boy,” she stated.

“He dropped the ball perhaps because he didn't have sufficient experience. Who is aware of? Individuals are very angry,” Gonzalez mentioned.

One other woman in the neighborhood where Arredondo grew up began sobbing when asked about him. The girl, who didn’t want to give her title, said one among her granddaughters was on the college in the course of the capturing however wasn’t harm.

Juan Torres, a U.S. Military veteran who was visibly upset with experiences popping out about the response, mentioned he knew Arredondo from highschool.

“You join to respond to those sorts of conditions” Torres mentioned. “If you are scared, then don’t be a police officer. Go flip burgers.”

After his election to the non-salaried spot on the Metropolis Council, Arredondo advised the Uvalde Leader-Information earlier this month that he was “able to hit the bottom working.”

“I have loads of ideas, and I definitely have loads of drive,” he said, adding he needed to focus not only on the town being fiscally responsible but additionally ensuring avenue repairs and beautification initiatives occur.

At a candidates’ forum earlier than his election, Arredondo said: “I guess to me nothing is difficult. Everything has a solution. That answer starts with communication. Communication is key.”

McCraw said Friday that minutes after the gunman entered the varsity, metropolis police officers entered by means of the same door. Over the course of greater than an hour, regulation enforcement from multiple businesses arrived on the scene. Lastly, officers said, a U.S. Border Patrol tactical crew used a janitor’s key to unlock the classroom door and kill the gunman.

McCraw said that students and academics had repeatedly begged 911 operators for help while Arredondo told greater than a dozen officers to attend in a hallway. That directive — which goes against established active-shooter protocols — prompted questions about whether or not extra lives were lost because officers didn’t act sooner.

Two legislation enforcement officials have said that as the gunman fired at students, regulation enforcement officers from other businesses urged Arredondo to allow them to move in because children had been in peril, The officials spoke on condition of anonymity as a result of they'd not been authorized to talk publicly concerning the investigation.

McLaughlin, the Uvalde mayor, pushed again on officials’ claims, including remarks revamped the weekend by Texas’ lieutenant governor, that they weren’t informed the truth concerning the massacre. McLaughlin said in his Monday assertion that local legislation enforcement hadn’t made any public comments concerning the investigation’s specifics or misled anybody.

Arredondo began out his profession in regulation enforcement working for the Uvalde Police Division. After spending 16 years there, he went to Laredo, a border metropolis situated 130 miles (209 kilometers) miles to the south, the place he worked on the Webb County Sheriff’s Office and then for a neighborhood college district, based on a 2020 article within the Uvalde Leader-Information on his return to his hometown to take the college district police chief job. The varsity district’s board of trustees authorized his appointment to the spot.

In response to the Uvalde faculty district’s website, the police force led by Arredondo additionally has 5 different officers and a safety guard.

Ray Garner, the police chief of the district in Laredo the place Arredondo labored, instructed the San Antonio Categorical-Information in a narrative printed after the Uvalde capturing that when Arredondo worked in the Laredo district he was “simple to speak to” and was involved in regards to the college students.

“He was a wonderful officer down here,” Garner told the newspaper . “Down here, we do numerous training on active-shooter situations, and he was concerned in those.”

Arredondo, who spoke only briefly at two brief news conferences on the day of the shooting, appeared behind state officers talking at information conferences over the following two days, but was not present at McCraw’s Friday information convention.

After that news convention, members of the media converged at Arredondo’s house and police cruisers took up posts there. At one point, a person answering the door at Arredondo’s house informed a reporter for The Related Press that Arredondo was “indisposed.”

“The truth will come out,” mentioned the person earlier than closing the door.

On Tuesday, Travis Considine, chief communications officer for the Texas Department of Public Security, said Arredondo had not responded to DPS interview requests for 2 days, Considine stated.

State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a Democrat whose district consists of Uvalde, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that he’s asking a lot of questions after “so many issues went incorrect.”

He stated one household instructed him that a first responder instructed them that their baby, who was shot within the again, possible bled out. “So, absolutely, these errors may have led to the passing away of those youngsters as well,” Gutierrez stated.

Gutierrez said whereas the issue of which law enforcement agency had or should have had operational management is a “significant” concern of his, he’s additionally “urged” to McCraw “that it’s not honest to put it on the local (school district) cop.”

“On the finish of the day, everybody failed here,” Gutierrez mentioned.

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Related Press writer Stengle contributed from Dallas, and likewise contributing were Curt Anderson in Miami, Jim Vertuno in Austin, Mike Balsamo in Washington and Elliott Spagat in Uvalde.

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Extra on the varsity shooting in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings