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

UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The blame for an excruciating delay in killing the gunman at a Texas elementary college — at the same time as dad and mom outside begged police to hurry in and panicked children known as 911 from inside — has been placed with the varsity district’s homegrown police chief.

It’s left residents in the small city of Uvalde struggling to reconcile what they know of the well-liked native lawman after the director of state police mentioned that the commander at the scene — Pete Arredondo — made the “fallacious resolution” last week to not 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, said on the Friday information conference that after following the gunman into the constructing, officers waited over an hour to breach the classroom. Nineteen youngsters and two teachers had 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 Metropolis Council after being elected earlier this month, however Mayor Don McLaughlin stated in an announcement Monday that the assembly wouldn’t occur. It wasn’t instantly clear whether the swearing-in would happen privately or at a later date.

“Pete Arredondo was duly elected to the City Council,” McLaughlin said in the statement. “There may be nothing in the Metropolis Charter, Election Code, or Texas Structure that prohibits him from taking the oath of office.”

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 faculty district.

When Arredondo was a boy, Maria Gonzalez used to drive him and her youngsters to the same college the place the taking pictures occurred. “He was an excellent boy,” she mentioned.

“He dropped the ball maybe because he did not have sufficient expertise. Who knows? Individuals are very angry,” Gonzalez said.

Another woman within the neighborhood where Arredondo grew up started sobbing when requested about him. The lady, who didn’t wish to give her title, mentioned considered one of her granddaughters was on the faculty throughout the taking pictures but wasn’t hurt.

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

“You enroll to answer those sorts of conditions” Torres mentioned. “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 Leader-Information earlier this month that he was “able to hit the bottom running.”

“I've plenty of ideas, and I positively have loads of drive,” he stated, adding he needed to focus not solely on the city being fiscally accountable but in addition making sure road repairs and beautification projects happen.

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

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

McCraw said that college students and lecturers had repeatedly begged 911 operators for help whereas Arredondo informed more than a dozen officers to wait in a hallway. That directive — which goes towards established active-shooter protocols — prompted questions on whether more lives were misplaced because officers didn’t act sooner.

Two law enforcement officers have mentioned that as the gunman fired at students, law enforcement officers from other businesses urged Arredondo to let them transfer in because children have been in danger, The officers spoke on situation of anonymity because that they had not been authorized to talk publicly concerning the investigation.

McLaughlin, the Uvalde mayor, pushed again on officials’ claims, together with remarks remodeled the weekend by Texas’ lieutenant governor, that they weren’t instructed the reality concerning the massacre. McLaughlin stated in his Monday statement that local law enforcement hadn’t made any public feedback in regards to the investigation’s specifics or misled anyone.

Arredondo started out his career in regulation enforcement working for the Uvalde Police Department. After spending 16 years there, he went to Laredo, a border metropolis situated 130 miles (209 kilometers) miles to the south, where he worked at the Webb County Sheriff’s Workplace after which for a local faculty district, in response to a 2020 article within the Uvalde Chief-Information on his return to his hometown to take the varsity district police chief job. The school district’s board of trustees authorized his appointment to the spot.

In keeping with the Uvalde faculty district’s website, the police drive led by Arredondo also has 5 different officers and a security guard.

Ray Garner, the police chief of the district in Laredo where Arredondo labored, informed the San Antonio Express-Information in a narrative printed after the Uvalde taking pictures that when Arredondo worked in the Laredo district he was “straightforward to talk to” and was involved concerning the students.

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

Arredondo, who spoke solely briefly at two brief news conferences on the day of the capturing, appeared behind state officials speaking at information conferences over the subsequent two days, but was not present at McCraw’s Friday news conference.

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

“The reality will come out,” stated the person before closing the door.

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

State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a Democrat whose district includes Uvalde, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that he’s asking loads of questions after “so many things went mistaken.”

He mentioned one family advised him that a first responder advised them that their baby, who was shot within the again, possible bled out. “So, absolutely, these errors might have led to the passing away of these kids as well,” Gutierrez stated.

Gutierrez mentioned whereas the issue of which regulation enforcement agency had or should have had operational control is a “significant” concern of his, he’s additionally “instructed” to McCraw “that it’s not truthful to place it on the local (school district) cop.”

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

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Associated Press author 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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More on the school taking pictures in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings