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Texas State Soldiers in Front of Rob Elementary School in Uwalde, Texas, USA, Tuesday, May 24, 2022. Fourteen students and a teacher were killed in a massacre at a primary school in Texas, the deadliest school shooting in the United States for more than four years
WWALDE, Texas – Two police officers from the town of Uwalde missed the fleeting chance to shoot a gunman in front of Rob Elementary School before he continued to kill 21 people at the school, a senior deputy sheriff told the New York Times.
This would mean a second missed opportunity for officers to stop Salvador Ramos before the May 24 riot at the school, which killed 19 children and two teachers. Officials said school district police passed Ramos without seeing him in the school parking lot.
Unidentified officers, one of whom was armed with an AR-15-style rifle, said they were afraid of hitting children playing on the fire line in front of the school, Deputy Chief Ricardo Rios of nearby Zavala County told the newspaper.
The chance of the police to stop Ramos passed quickly, maybe in seconds, Rios said.
Reports from the Associated Press to Rios and the Zavala County Sheriff’s Office have not been returned. Zavala County Sheriff’s Officers responded to the shooting in support of Uwalde and Uwalde County officials.
Rios said he shared the information with a special commission of the test house investigating the school massacre.
Police in Uwalde agreed to speak to the commission of inquiry on Friday, according to a Republican MP leading the investigation, who has begun to publicly question why officers did not cooperate earlier.
“It took a little longer than we originally expected,” said State Representative Dustin Burroughs.
On Thursday, Burroughs signaled impatience with Uwalde police, tweeting that most people had cooperated fully in their investigation “to help establish the facts” and that he did not understand why city police “would not want the same.” He did not say which members of the department would meet with the commission, which will continue to question witnesses in Uwalde on Monday over the attack, which killed 19 students and two teachers.
Uwalde police did not respond to requests for comment.
MORE: Shooting at Uvalde School: Police inaction at the center of the investigation
Weeks after one of the deadliest school shootings in US history, law enforcement officials stopped providing updates on what they had learned about the shooting and police response. Their silence came after authorities gave conflicting and false accounts in the days after the shooting, sometimes withdrawing statements hours after they were made.
Officials also did not release records sought under public information laws to the media, including the Associated Press, often citing broad exceptions and an ongoing investigation. He raised concerns about whether such recordings would be released, even to the families of the victims.
So far, the state chamber has questioned more than a dozen witnesses behind closed doors, including state police, school staff and school district police. The list of witnesses provided by the commission so far does not include Pete Arendondo, police chief in the Uwalde school district, who has been criticized for his actions during the attack.
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Burroughs defended the commission, which is questioning witnesses in private and has not disclosed their findings so far, saying its members want an accurate account before issuing a report.
“One person’s truth may be different from another person’s truth,” Burroughs said Friday.
After the shooting, Republican leaders in Texas called for more funding for mental health, but no new gun restrictions. Authorities say the 18-year-old shooter used an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle. Police did not confront the shooter for more than an hour, even when tortured parents outside the school called for officers to enter. —— Find more AP coverage of the shooting at the school in Uwalde:
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