Texas Director of Public Safety Steven McCraw led an emotional press conference Friday morning in Uvalde, Texas, to provide a timeline of Tuesday’s massacre at Robb Elementary School based upon video and 911 evidence. McCraw also detailed the number of magazines and live and spent rounds collected at the various crime scenes from both the shooter and law enforcement, and clarified previous information reported about the killer’s social media postings.
The most devastating information McCraw shared was that officers didn’t enter the classroom upon arrival — a total of 1 hour and 15 minutes elapsed from the time the first Uvalde PD officers arrived until the shooter was killed — because the on-scene commander “believed that it had transitioned from an active shooter to a barricaded subject,” and during that time numerous 911 calls were made from inside the adjoining classrooms where the carnage was ongoing.
Texas official: Police didn't enter the school because the "on-scene-commander" wrongly believed "there were no more children at risk."
"Obviously, based upon the information we have, there were children in that classroom that were at risk…" pic.twitter.com/k07MUQaK8T
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) May 27, 2022
Here is the timeline as provided by video and 911 evidence:
- 11:27 AM – Exterior door where shooter entered was propped open by a teacher.
- 11:28 AM – Shooter’s vehicle crashes into a ditch.
- 11:28 AM – Teacher runs to room 132 to retrieve her phone and door remains propped open.
- 11:30 AM – Teacher calls 911 to report the crash and a man with a gun.
- 11:31 AM – The suspect reaches last row of vehicles in the school parking lot.
- 11:31 AM – Shooter approaches school, shooting at the classroom windows as he approaches.
- 11:31 AM – Patrol vehicles arrive at funeral home.
- 11:32 AM – Multiple shots fired at the school.
- 11:33 AM – Shooter enters the school, begins firing into room 111 or 112; at least 100 rounds fired.
- 11:35 AM – Three Uvalde PD officers enter school through same door shooter entered, quickly followed by three more Uvalde PD and one sheriff’s deputy.
- 11:36 AM – Three Uvalde PD officers approach the classroom door and two are shot; they fall back.
- 11:37 AM – Shooter fires 16 rounds.
- 11:51 AM – Police sergeant arrived.
- 12:03 PM – Additional officers arrive; “There were as many as 19 officers at that time in that hallway.”
- 12:03 PM – 911 call from room 112 lasting 1 minute, 23 seconds.
- 12:10 PM – 911 call from room 112, advised multiple are dead.
- 12:13 PM – 911 call from room 112.
- 12:16 PM – 911 call from room 111, caller reporting there are eight to nine students alive.
- 12:15 PM – Members of BORTAC arrived, along with shields.
- 12:19 PM – 911 call from room 111, caller hung up when another student told them to.
- 12:21 PM – Shooter fired again, “It was believed to be at the door.”
- 12:21 PM – 911 call from room 111.
- 12:21 PM – Law enforcement moved down the hallway.
- 12:26 PM – 911 call from student lasting 26 seconds.
- 12:26 PM – 911 call from the same student, reports that the killer shot the door. Student was told to stay on the line and to be very quiet.
- 12:46 PM – 911 caller says she can hear police next door.
- 12:47 PM – Asked 911 to “please send the police now.”
- 12:50 PM – Officers breached the locked classroom door using keys provided by the janitor.
While giving the timeline, McCraw said that when the three Uvalde police officers went to the classroom door, two of them received “grazing” wounds before they retreated. With seven officers there and knowing there was no way that classroom could have been evacuated in that short period of time, there is no excuse for the officers not finding a way into that classroom, whether through a window or by knocking down the door.
He also explained that the ISD officer was not on campus when the crash occurred. He heard the 911 call about the crash and a man with a gun near the school and sped to the campus, to the person he thought was the man with the gun, but that turned out to be a teacher. “In doing so, he drove right by the suspect, who was hunkered down behind a vehicle, where he began shooting at the school.”
The killer had a total of 60 magazines and 1,657 rounds of ammunition. The magazines were found as follows:
- 3 on killer’s body
- 2 in room 112
- 6 in room 11 – 5 on the ground, 1 in the rifle
- 1 just outside school building
- 31 inside killer’s backpack
- 15 at crash site
- 2 at killer’s residence
The ammunition is accounted for as follows:
- 350 inside the school; 142 spent and 173 live
- 922 outside the school but on school property; 22 spent, 900 live
- 422 at the crash site; 22 spent, 400 live
There were 35 spent law enforcement cartridges; 8 in the hallway, 27 in the classroom where the suspect was killed.
Contrary to reports that the shooter had posted publicly on Facebook that day that he was going to shoot his grandmother, and then that he had done so, and then that he was heading to the school, McCraw said that those postings were private Facebook messages and not public. He also said that in September 2021, Ramos asked his sister to help him buy a gun but she flatly refused.
McCraw made it clear that “There were plenty officers to do whatever needed to be done, with one exception, is that the incident commander inside believed they needed more equipment and more officers to do a tactical breach at that point,” and that “Texas embraces the active shooter doctrine.”
Texas DPS Official:
"Texas embraces and teaches the active shooter doctrine…as long as there’s kids, as long as there’s, someone is firing, you go to the gun, you find them, you neutralize them. Period." pic.twitter.com/uiRWJpbTxG
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) May 27, 2022
The entire press conference can be viewed here.