‘Very indignant’: Uvalde locals grapple with college chief’s position

UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The blame for an excruciating delay in killing the gunman at a Texas elementary college — whilst parents outside begged police to hurry in and panicked kids known as 911 from inside — has been placed with the school 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 stated that the commander at the scene — Pete Arredondo — made the “wrong resolution” final week not to breach a classroom at Robb Elementary School sooner, believing the gunman was barricaded inside and kids weren’t at risk.

Steven McCraw, the head of the Texas Division of Public Safety, mentioned 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 capturing.

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 Metropolis Council after being elected earlier this month, however Mayor Don McLaughlin mentioned in a statement Monday that the assembly wouldn’t occur. It wasn’t instantly clear whether or not the swearing-in would happen privately or at a later date.

“Pete Arredondo was duly elected to the City Council,” McLaughlin stated within the statement. “There is nothing in the Metropolis Constitution, 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 law enforcement in Uvalde, returning in 2020 to take the head police job on the school district.

When Arredondo was a boy, Maria Gonzalez used to drive him and her youngsters to the same faculty where the shooting occurred. “He was a superb boy,” she stated.

“He dropped the ball maybe because he did not have enough experience. Who knows? People are very angry,” Gonzalez stated.

One other lady within the neighborhood the place Arredondo grew up started sobbing when asked about him. The woman, who didn’t need to give her identify, mentioned considered one of her granddaughters was on the college in the course of the taking pictures but wasn’t damage.

Juan Torres, a U.S. Military veteran who was visibly upset with experiences popping out concerning the response, said he knew Arredondo from high school.

“You enroll to answer these kinds of situations” 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 Chief-News earlier this month that he was “ready to hit the ground running.”

“I have plenty of concepts, and I undoubtedly have loads of drive,” he said, adding he wished to focus not solely on town being fiscally responsible but additionally making sure street repairs and beautification initiatives occur.

At a candidates’ discussion board earlier than his election, Arredondo mentioned: “I suppose to me nothing is complicated. The whole lot has an answer. That resolution starts with communication. Communication is key.”

McCraw mentioned Friday that minutes after the gunman entered the school, metropolis police officers entered by means of the identical door. Over the course of more than an hour, regulation enforcement from a number of agencies arrived on the scene. Lastly, officers stated, a U.S. Border Patrol tactical workforce used a janitor’s key to unlock the classroom door and kill the gunman.

McCraw mentioned that students and academics had repeatedly begged 911 operators for help whereas Arredondo advised greater than a dozen officers to wait in a hallway. That directive — which goes towards established active-shooter protocols — prompted questions about whether extra lives have been misplaced because officers didn’t act faster.

Two legislation enforcement officials have mentioned that because the gunman fired at students, legislation 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 because that they had not been authorized to talk publicly about the investigation.

McLaughlin, the Uvalde mayor, pushed back on officers’ claims, including remarks made over the weekend by Texas’ lieutenant governor, that they weren’t instructed the truth about the massacre. McLaughlin said in his Monday assertion that local regulation enforcement hadn’t made any public feedback concerning the investigation’s specifics or misled anyone.

Arredondo began out his career 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 labored at the Webb County Sheriff’s Workplace after which for a neighborhood faculty district, according to a 2020 article within the Uvalde Chief-News on his return to his hometown to take the college district police chief job. The school district’s board of trustees authorized his appointment to the spot.

According to the Uvalde school district’s web site, the police force led by Arredondo additionally has 5 different officers and a security guard.

Ray Garner, the police chief of the district in Laredo the place Arredondo labored, informed the San Antonio Categorical-News in a narrative published after the Uvalde taking pictures that when Arredondo worked within the Laredo district he was “simple to talk to” and was concerned about the students.

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

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

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

“The truth will come out,” stated the man earlier than closing the door.

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

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

He mentioned one family instructed him that a first responder told them that their baby, who was shot in the back, seemingly bled out. “So, completely, these mistakes may have led to the passing away of these youngsters as nicely,” Gutierrez stated.

Gutierrez stated while the issue of which legislation enforcement company had or ought to have had operational management is a “vital” concern of his, he’s also “suggested” to McCraw “that it’s not honest to place it on the native (school district) cop.”

“At the end of the day, all people failed here,” Gutierrez mentioned.

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Related Press author Stengle contributed from Dallas, and also 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