‘Very angry’: Uvalde locals grapple with college chief’s role

UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The blame for an excruciating delay in killing the gunman at a Texas elementary faculty — whilst parents exterior begged police to hurry in and panicked children known as 911 from inside — has been placed with the college 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 native lawman after the director of state police said that the commander on the scene — Pete Arredondo — made the “flawed decision” final week to not breach a classroom at Robb Elementary School sooner, believing the gunman was barricaded inside and children weren’t in danger.

Steven McCraw, the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, mentioned at the Friday information convention that after following the gunman into the building, officers waited over an hour to breach the classroom. Nineteen youngsters and two lecturers were killed within the capturing.

Arredondo, who grew up in Uvalde and graduated from high school here, was set to be sworn in Tuesday to his new spot on the Metropolis Council after being elected earlier this month, but Mayor Don McLaughlin stated in a statement Monday that the meeting wouldn’t occur. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the swearing-in would occur privately or at a later date.

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

The 50-year-old Arredondo has spent a lot of a nearly 30-year profession in law enforcement in Uvalde, returning in 2020 to take the top police job at the school district.

When Arredondo was a boy, Maria Gonzalez used to drive him and her children to the same faculty where the capturing happened. “He was a very good boy,” she said.

“He dropped the ball possibly because he did not have sufficient expertise. Who is aware of? Persons are very angry,” Gonzalez mentioned.

Another lady in the neighborhood the place Arredondo grew up started sobbing when requested about him. The woman, who didn’t need to give her identify, said one of her granddaughters was on the college during the shooting however wasn’t harm.

Juan Torres, a U.S. Army veteran who was visibly upset with reports popping out concerning the response, stated he knew Arredondo from highschool.

“You join to answer these kinds of conditions” Torres stated. “In case you are scared, then don’t be a police officer. Go flip burgers.”

After his election to the non-salaried spot on the City Council, Arredondo informed the Uvalde Leader-News earlier this month that he was “ready to hit the bottom working.”

“I have plenty of ideas, and I positively have loads of drive,” he said, adding he wished to focus not solely on town being fiscally accountable but in addition making sure road repairs and beautification tasks occur.

At a candidates’ forum earlier than his election, Arredondo mentioned: “I suppose to me nothing is sophisticated. Every thing has a solution. That solution starts with communication. Communication is vital.”

McCraw stated Friday that minutes after the gunman entered the college, city police officers entered through the identical door. Over the course of greater than an hour, law enforcement from a number of businesses arrived on the scene. Lastly, officials mentioned, a U.S. Border Patrol tactical workforce used a janitor’s key to unlock the classroom door and kill the gunman.

McCraw stated that college students and academics had repeatedly begged 911 operators for help while Arredondo advised more than a dozen officers to attend in a hallway. That directive — which fits against established active-shooter protocols — prompted questions on whether extra lives were misplaced as a result of officers didn’t act quicker.

Two regulation enforcement officials have mentioned that as the gunman fired at college students, law enforcement officers from other agencies urged Arredondo to allow them to transfer in because youngsters have been at risk, The officers spoke on situation of anonymity because they'd not been licensed to talk publicly concerning the investigation.

McLaughlin, the Uvalde mayor, pushed again on officials’ claims, including remarks made over the weekend by Texas’ lieutenant governor, that they weren’t told the truth concerning the massacre. McLaughlin stated in his Monday assertion that local regulation enforcement hadn’t made any public feedback in regards to the investigation’s specifics or misled anyone.

Arredondo started out his profession in law enforcement working for the Uvalde Police Department. After spending 16 years there, he went to Laredo, a border city situated 130 miles (209 kilometers) miles to the south, the place he worked at the Webb County Sheriff’s Office and then for a local faculty district, based on a 2020 article in the Uvalde Chief-News on his return to his hometown to take the school district police chief job. The school district’s board of trustees authorized his appointment to the spot.

In line with the Uvalde school district’s web site, the police power led by Arredondo also has 5 different officers and a security guard.

Ray Garner, the police chief of the district in Laredo the place Arredondo worked, advised the San Antonio Specific-News in a story published after the Uvalde shooting that when Arredondo worked within the Laredo district he was “simple to talk to” and was involved in regards to the students.

“He was an excellent officer down right here,” Garner instructed the newspaper . “Down right here, we do a lot of training on active-shooter situations, and he was involved in those.”

Arredondo, who spoke only briefly at two brief information conferences on the day of the capturing, appeared behind state officers talking at information conferences over the following two days, however was not current at McCraw’s Friday news 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 reality will come out,” said the man earlier than closing the door.

On Tuesday, Travis Considine, chief communications officer for the Texas Division of Public Safety, stated Arredondo had not responded to DPS interview requests for two days, Considine stated.

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

He mentioned one family told him that a first responder told them that their little one, who was shot within the again, doubtless bled out. “So, absolutely, these mistakes might have led to the passing away of these children as effectively,” Gutierrez said.

Gutierrez said whereas the issue of which law enforcement agency had or should have had operational management is a “vital” concern of his, he’s additionally “suggested” to McCraw “that it’s not fair to place it on the local (college district) cop.”

“On the finish of the day, all people failed here,” Gutierrez said.

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

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