UVA LDE, Texas—Local residents voiced anger Thursday about the time it took to end the mass shooting at an elementary school here, as police laid out a fresh timeline that showed the gunman entered the building unobstructed after lingering outside for 12 minutes firing shots. Victor Escallop, a regional director for the Texas Department of Public Safety, gave a new timeline of how the now-deceased gunman, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, walked into Robb Elementary School, barricaded himself in a classroom and killed 19 children and two teachers.
Mr. Escalon said he couldn’t say why no one stopped Ramos from entering the school during that time Tuesday. Most of the shots Ramos fired came during the first several minutes after he entered the school, Mr. Escalon said.
People who arrived at the school while Ramos locked himself in a classroom, or saw videos of police waiting outside, were furious.
“The police were doing nothing,” said Angelo Rose Gomez, who after learning about the shooting drove 40 miles to Robb Elementary, where her children are in second and third grade. They were just standing outside the fence. They weren’t going in there or running anywhere. Mr. Escalon said officers inside the school were evacuating students and school employees from the premises, as well as calling for backup. “There’s a lot going on,” he said. Department of Public Safety officials previously said an armed school officer confronted Ramos as he arrived at the school. Mr. Escalon said Thursday that information was incorrect and no one encountered Ramos as he arrived at the school. “There was not an officer readily available and armed,” Mr. Escalon said. Ramos shot his grandmother Tuesday morning and drove her truck to Robb Elementary School, crashing the vehicle into a nearby ditch at 11:28 a.m., according to the timeline laid out by Mr. Escalon. He then began shooting at people at a funeral home across the street, prompting a 911 call reporting a gunman at the school at 11:30. Ramos climbed a chain-link fence about 8 feet high onto school grounds and began firing before walking inside, unimpeded, at 11:40. The first police arrived on the scene at 11:44 and exchanged gunfire with Ramos, who locked himself in a fourth-grade classroom. There, he killed the students and teachers. A border patrol tactical team went into the school an hour later, around 12:40 p.m., and was able to get into the classroom and kill Ramos, Mr. Escalon said. Kaitlyn Martinez, a fourth-grader at Robb Elementary, was playing with other kids during recess when Ramos first appeared on school grounds with an AR-15 style rifle.
“We all ran in they told us to sit down and turned off the lights and locked the door,” the 10-year-old said, holding back tears, as she laid flowers with her family at a makeshift memorial for victims in downtown Uvalde.
Kaitlyn said three police officers eventually came to the door of her room, which was near the one in which Ramos locked himself. “They told us there was a gunman, so we had to evacuate we all had to run to the parking spaces,” she recalled. Outside she found her mother, Gladys Castillo, who had been pleading with police to act more aggressively to end the standoff as she waited. Ms. Gomez, a farm supervisor, was also waiting outside for her children. She said she was one of numerous parents who began encouraging—first politely, and then with more urgency—police and other law enforcement to enter the school sooner. After a few minutes, she said, U.S. Marshals put her in handcuffs, telling her she was being arrested for intervening in an active investigation.
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