UVALDE, Texas – The Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District on Wednesday released more than 2,100 files related to the Robb Elementary School shooting, including termination paperwork for former district police Chief Pete Arredondo.
Files released to media outlets also include:
- Robb work orders and maintenance records from 2017-2022
- Communications related to the principal’s administrative leave and return
- Documents related to the Social Sentinel, StopIt and Raptor systems
- All previous Public Information Act requests related to Robb
- Additional relevant correspondence
- Two videos that were pulled and saved from the internet
Wednesday’s release comes amid a series of delays.
Here are the takeaways from the release:
Arredondo’s attorneys asked UCISD for $1.1 million settlement
Email records show that then-Superintendent Hal Harrell told Arredondo on July 19, 2022, that he would recommend Arredondo’s termination to the UCISD board. At the time, Arredondo was placed on administrative leave with pay.
“You did not act to create an Incident Command Center, nor did you act as the ICC leader or Initial Incident Commander,” Harrell’s letter to Arredondo states.
“It is unknown what may have been different had you followed your training and followed the EOP to organize the situation; however, the lack of leadership in this situation leads me to no other option other than to make my recommendation to the board,” the letter states.
A letter from Arredondo’s attorney, dated July 25, 2022, defended Arredondo’s actions and said “100% of the fault” should rest on the gunman.
“There is no evidence to support a finding of good cause to justify termination in this matter. In fact, the evidence clearly and convincingly demonstrates outstanding conduct by Chief Arredondo in one of the most horrible situations anyone could imagine law enforcement to encounter, an active shooter who barricades himself in a classroom designed to keep people out, who takes and shoots children and educators hostages,” the letter states. “No blame should be placed on Chief Arredondo from this event. None of his decisions or actions demonstrate a failure to meet the accepted standards of conduct for law enforcement officers in similarly situated school districts in Texas.”
His attorneys asked for the district to pay a settlement cost of $1.1 million, legal fees and a $25,000 relocation allowance, as well as other conditions, in exchange for Arredondo’s resignation under “honorable conditions.”
Arredondo was the District 3 city councilman at the time of the shooting but resigned in July 2022. He was fired from UCISD in August 2022.
Arredondo currently faces charges of child endangerment.
Years of work orders revealed
A work order summary list shows a history of issues with door locks.
In a request from May 2017, a report was made about a jammed lock for Room 110 at Robb Elementary.
“Key only goes in halfway and will not lock,” the request states.
>> Records show repeated issues with Robb Elementary doors before massacre, CNN reports
In a request from January 2017, a person reported they were not able to open the door to Room 19 at Robb Elementary.
In January 2022, a person reported that a door on the south hallway needed to be slammed in order for it to close. That work order was completed the following month.
Another request from April 2022 stated that a door in the west hallway was not closing.
“Stays open need to close it hard for it [to] close,” the work order states. The order was completed the following day.
It’s unclear if the shooter went through any of these entrances.
In the days following the massacre, then-Texas DPS Director Steve McCraw claimed the shooter entered the school through a door that was propped open by a teacher.
The teacher did close the door, but it did not lock as it should have.
McCraw also made additional claims that were later proven inaccurate during the investigation, such as stating that his troopers had confronted the shooter immediately.
Body-worn video, hallway footage released
The only videos released on Wednesday were body-worn camera footage lasting approximately 3 hours and 19 minutes, and hallway footage lasting about 1 hour and 22 minutes.
According to KSAT’s attorneys, the two videos were used as exhibits in Arredondo’s termination hearing.
“Both videos are compilations of footage from an unknown third-party source. According to Walsh’s attorneys, these videos appear to be copies of publicly available videos downloaded from public websites. They are not original footage. It remains our understanding that the original video footage was seized and is in the possession of DPS,” according to UCISD’s attorneys.
In the body-worn camera, an officer is seen arriving at the campus and walking outside the school.
“He made it into the building?” someone asks off-camera.
“Yes,” the officer responded.
“Where’s he at?” someone else asked off-camera.
“I don’t know,” the officer said.
“They said he went into the building,” the officer says in the video.
“Which building?” someone asks.
“I’m not sure, I’m not sure,” the officer replied.
In the video, several minutes pass as officers question their next move. No one seems to be in command.
“Are we going in or are we staying here? What are we doing?” the officer later asks.
The video appears to be edited and taken from more than one officer’s body-worn camera.
Footage also shows officers inside the school, sweeping classrooms and standing in the hallway with other law enforcement officers.
At one point, an officer is seen trying to use a knife to try and a door with Arredondo nearby.
“Does anyone have any breacher tools?” an officer is heard saying off-camera.
“We gotta get these kids out,” an officer is heard saying.
Officers did not breach the door and kill the gunman until approximately 77 minutes after the first officers arrived at the school, even as students inside the classrooms called 911.
In the hallway video, the gunman is seen crashing his vehicle near the campus and walking into the school at 11:33 a.m.
The video does not include the child’s screams but does include the sound of gunfire. Officers are seen milling around in the hallway until law enforcement officers breach the door.
Then-Principal Mandy Gutierrez strikes back at criticism
Then-Robb Principal Mandy Gutierrez responded to criticism following a Texas House report that claimed school officials were insufficiently prepared for the threat of an armed intruder on campus.
In an email to Harrell and two others on July 25, 2022, Gutierrez said the report “lacks some information that is pertinent to the investigation.”
Gutierrez said that in August 2021, she emailed UCISD Director of Maintenance Rodney Harrison and brought up safety concerns about classroom keys. She asked if extra keys could be made for substitute teachers so they could leave the classrooms locked throughout the day.
She included Arredondo and other district and Robb officials in that email, which Gutierrez provided a copy of.
“What is the protocol and cost for a request such as this?” Gutierrez asked in the 2021 email. “... If other campuses have adopted a safe, alternative, practice I would be interested in any suggestions or alternatives. At this time I am prioritizing student safety and am open to any practices that ensure the well-being of our students and staff.”
In her email to Harrell in 2022, Gutierrez said she “was aware that our campus was growing in size and was trying to find a solution to teacher concerns.”
Gutierrez refuted several of the findings in the report, which was prepared by a Texas House special investigating committee and released in July 2022.
>> FULL REPORT: Read the Texas House report on Uvalde school shooting, failed police response
At the time, the 81-page report was the most comprehensive view of what took place leading up to and during the shooting. Findings were based on law enforcement interviews with family members, data on the shooter’s phone, and testimony presented to the committee.
“The events of May 24, 2022, were tragic and horrific. As the campus administrator I followed district protocol for a lockdown to the best of my ability, using the system that my supervisors put in place in February 2022,” Gutierrez wrote in the email.
She also said she felt “the actions taken against me are unjustifiable.”
Gutierrez was placed on administrative leave following the release of the report. She was allowed to return to work on July 28, 2022, records show.
In August 2022, UCISD announced she would be shifting positions, changing her title to assistant director of special education.
Background
In July, 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 massacre.
While UCISD released thousands of pages of documents in batches in August, not all records have been turned over to media outlets.
In August, Walsh Gallegos — the firm that represented the district during the records lawsuit — admitted they “made an error” by not releasing all the records initially.
The UCISD board later voted unanimously to hire a new law firm, Thompson & Horton, to represent the district.
Nineteen children and two teachers died in the May 24, 2022, shooting. Family members of the victims were among those who pushed for the records to be released.
Uvalde County released its records, including body-worn camera footage, in August.
Attorneys: 1 million pages to be released
According to a September letter from an attorney representing KSAT, UCISD “has not produced all emails, texts, and other correspondence” from district officials.
Far fewer communications have been produced for many of them, including Arredondo and former Uvalde CISD officer Adrian Gonzales. Both are facing charges after authorities said he failed to protect children during the shooting.
There are approximately 1 million additional pages of documents that the district is planning to release, the letter states. Attorneys have requested that the documents be handed over at one time.
What has been released
UCISD has released thousands of records, including emails to and from then-Superintendent Hal Harrell, in batches.
Uvalde County also released nearly seven hours of footage and 1,576 pages of emails, text messages and other documents.
The records were released after a state appeals court judge sided with KSAT and other media organizations in a 2022 lawsuit against Uvalde CISD and the county.
In separate meetings in July, UCISD and the county voted to stop fighting the appeal and release the records.
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