Steve McCraw condemns local police chief Pedro Arredondo for ‘deciding to place the lives of officers over the lives of children’
Steve McCraw at the special committee in Texas on Tuesday. McCraw said: ‘Post-Columbine doctrine is clear and unambiguous: stop the killing [and] stop the dying.’Steve McCraw at the special committee in Texas on Tuesday. McCraw said: ‘Post-Columbine doctrine is clear and unambiguous: stop the killing [and] stop the dying.
“The officers had weapons – the children had none. The officers had body armor – the children had none. The officers had training – the subject had none.”Arredondo himself was called to testify at a separate committee on Tuesday, of local Texas state representatives who are also examining the police response in Uvalde. That hearing is closed to the public. Arredondo reportedly arrived through a back entrance, avoiding journalists and members of the public.
McCraw said nine officers was “a sufficient number … to isolate, distract and neutralize” the gunman.prepared by the state senate committee, four minutes after arriving, Arredondo called Uvalde’s municipal police department to request a tactical team, claiming incorrectly that the officers had only pistols and were therefore outgunned.
Eventually, 70 minutes after the officers gathered in the nearby hallway, Arredondo ordered them to storm the classroom, where they killed the intruder, who had fatally shot 21 students and teachers while wounding 17 others. “There’s compelling evidence that the law enforcement response to the attack at Robb elementary was an abject failure and antithetical to everything we’ve learned over the last two decades,” McCraw said.