UVALDE, Texas – For the second time in two days, the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District (UCISD) released thousands of pages of correspondence regarding the aftermath of the Robb Elementary School shooting.
On Tuesday, the school district released more than 3,400 pages related to the shooting.
Wednesday’s trove of documents amounted to nearly 4,000 pages (3,971) worth of documents, including emails among district officials.
There were also emails from lawyers, state lawmakers and survey responses from residents and non-residents who expressed their disgust at how they view the district’s response to the shooting.
A KSAT team of journalists reviewed the documents on Wednesday afternoon and evening.
Among the documents was a letter from Lynn Deming, a fourth grade teacher at Robb Elementary. Deming emailed the letter to two district officials, including now-former Uvalde CISD Superintendent Hal Harrell, just before 4:30 p.m. on June 12, 2022.
In the letter, Deming wrote she was taking her students to recess when she heard the sound of gunfire.
“I closed the door between our classrooms gunshots came through my windows. I fell on the floor and began knocking desks over onto my legs so I wouldn’t make noise, but I could block the students from bullets,” Deming wrote, in part. “I told my students I loved them, I told them to stay quiet, and I told them to pray. Once the gunshots sounded like they were in the building, I sent a message to my husband telling him I love him and my children.”
Later in the letter, Deming wrote that she believed May 24, 2022, would be her last day.
“I had shrapnel in my back from when he shot in my window, I had blood all over the back of me, but I tried to stay calm for my students,” Deming continued. “I knew I had to stay calm when he came into my classroom. I needed my students to hear they were loved in case it was the last thing they ever heard.”
At 4:50 p.m., Uvalde CISD Assistant Superintendent Beth Reavis emailed Harrell about Deming’s letter.
“I have some concerns/thoughts,” Reavis wrote to Harrell.
Two days later, now-former Uvalde CISD School Board President Cal Lambert emailed Harrell about Deming’s letter.
“If she is correct in stating so, I am surprised and disappointed if no one from the district has reached out to her or checked on her,” Lambert wrote. “I had no idea she was injured or I would have reached out to her.”
Lambert also wrote that he doesn’t know who was injured or hospitalized on the day of the shooting because no one gave him that information.
Background
The final batch of documents, which local authorities withheld during a yearslong legal battle over public access, was supposed to be released on Aug. 11.
UCISD did release emails, Texas Public Information Act requests from reporters and student records about the 18-year-old gunman at that time — but not all their records.
>> Uvalde County records, bodycam videos show chaos, missteps and frustrations in Robb shooting
On Aug. 25, the board met in closed session for more than two hours to consult with attorneys about “legal issues related to the potential release of information related to the Robb Elementary tragedy.”
“We were not aware these records were not being released. We voted unanimously for these records to be released,” Uvalde CISD Vice President JJ Suarez said on Aug. 25.
The district’s attorney said it was the law firm’s fault for not providing all the records, not the board’s or the superintendent’s.
“There’s no excuse for that, sir. You can call it a mistake, an error — it’s a costly error," Trustee Jesse Rizo said.
Among those missing records are emails about classroom safety and a payout to the district’s police chief, according to documents viewed by CNN.
Last month, a state appeals court judge sided with KSAT and other media organizations in a 2022 lawsuit against the district and county seeking the release of their records related to the mass shooting.
Family members of the victims were among those pushing for the records to be released.
On Aug. 12, Uvalde County released a trove of records, including video that showed the chaotic moment officers breached the door and killed the gunman. The City of Uvalde released body camera footage and recordings of 911 calls in August 2024.
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