‘Very offended’: 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 school — even as parents outdoors begged police to hurry in and panicked kids referred to as 911 from inside — has been placed with the school district’s homegrown police chief.

It’s left residents within the small city of Uvalde struggling to reconcile what they know of the favored native lawman after the director of state police said that the commander at the scene — Pete Arredondo — made the “mistaken determination” 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 head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, stated on the Friday news conference that after following the gunman into the constructing, officers waited over an hour to breach the classroom. Nineteen youngsters and two academics were killed within the shooting.

Arredondo, who grew up in Uvalde and graduated from highschool 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 an announcement Monday that the meeting wouldn’t happen. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the swearing-in would happen privately or at a later date.

“Pete Arredondo was duly elected to the Metropolis Council,” McLaughlin said within the assertion. “There's nothing in the City Charter, Election Code, or Texas Constitution 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 legislation enforcement in Uvalde, returning in 2020 to take the top police job on the faculty district.

When Arredondo was a boy, Maria Gonzalez used to drive him and her kids to the identical college the place the shooting occurred. “He was boy,” she stated.

“He dropped the ball maybe because he didn't have sufficient experience. Who knows? Individuals are very indignant,” Gonzalez stated.

Another girl within the neighborhood where Arredondo grew up started sobbing when requested about him. The woman, who didn’t need to give her title, said one in all her granddaughters was on the school in the course of the capturing however wasn’t harm.

Juan Torres, a U.S. Army veteran who was visibly upset with studies coming out concerning the response, stated he knew Arredondo from high school.

“You sign up to reply to those sorts 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 advised the Uvalde Chief-News earlier this month that he was “able to hit the bottom working.”

“I've plenty of concepts, and I undoubtedly have plenty of drive,” he stated, including he wished to focus not only on the city being fiscally responsible but also making sure avenue repairs and beautification tasks happen.

At a candidates’ discussion board earlier than his election, Arredondo mentioned: “I suppose to me nothing is sophisticated. Every part has an answer. That solution begins with communication. Communication is vital.”

McCraw mentioned Friday that minutes after the gunman entered the school, city cops entered through the identical door. Over the course of more than an hour, regulation enforcement from a number of agencies arrived on the scene. Lastly, officials said, a U.S. Border Patrol tactical group used a janitor’s key to unlock the classroom door and kill the gunman.

McCraw said that students and teachers had repeatedly begged 911 operators for assist whereas Arredondo instructed greater than a dozen officers to attend in a hallway. That directive — which goes in opposition to established active-shooter protocols — prompted questions about whether or not extra lives had been misplaced as a result of officers didn’t act faster.

Two legislation enforcement officials have said that as the gunman fired at students, law enforcement officers from different companies urged Arredondo to let them move in because youngsters had been in peril, The officers spoke on situation of anonymity as a result of they'd not been licensed to talk publicly in regards to the investigation.

McLaughlin, the Uvalde mayor, pushed back on officials’ claims, including remarks made over the weekend by Texas’ lieutenant governor, that they weren’t informed the reality in regards to the massacre. McLaughlin stated in his Monday statement that local regulation enforcement hadn’t made any public comments in regards to the investigation’s specifics or misled anyone.

Arredondo started out his career in law enforcement working for the Uvalde Police Division. After spending 16 years there, he went to Laredo, a border city located 130 miles (209 kilometers) miles to the south, where he worked on the Webb County Sheriff’s Workplace after which for a neighborhood school district, in line with a 2020 article within the Uvalde Leader-Information on his return to his hometown to take the varsity district police chief job. The school district’s board of trustees accepted his appointment to the spot.

In accordance with the Uvalde faculty district’s website, the police drive led by Arredondo also has five different officers and a safety guard.

Ray Garner, the police chief of the district in Laredo where Arredondo labored, advised the San Antonio Categorical-Information in a story revealed after the Uvalde capturing that when Arredondo labored in the Laredo district he was “simple to talk to” and was involved in regards to the college students.

“He was a superb officer down right here,” Garner advised the newspaper . “Down here, we do quite a lot of coaching on active-shooter eventualities, and he was involved in these.”

Arredondo, who spoke only briefly at two brief news conferences on the day of the taking pictures, appeared behind state officials talking at information conferences over the next two days, but was not present at McCraw’s Friday information conference.

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

“The reality will come out,” said the man before closing the door.

On Tuesday, Travis Considine, chief communications officer for the Texas Division of Public Security, mentioned Arredondo had not responded to DPS interview requests for two 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 loads of questions after “so many things went fallacious.”

He said one family instructed him that a first responder told them that their child, who was shot within the back, probably bled out. “So, completely, these errors could have led to the passing away of these kids as nicely,” Gutierrez stated.

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

“At the finish of the day, all people failed here,” Gutierrez stated.

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Related Press author Stengle contributed from Dallas, and in addition contributing have been 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 capturing in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings