Report on Uvalde Mass Shooting to Be Released This Week

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(TNS) – The Department of Justice on Thursday is expected to release its long-awaited report on the Robb Elementary School mass shooting, according to Uvalde officials.

But what the report will say remains a mystery.

Ashley Chohlis, the superintendent of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, revealed the DOJ’s plan during a school board meeting on Monday.

“The U.S. Department of Justice notified me today that they will be releasing their critical incident report for May 24 on Thursday, this Thursday, January 18, in the afternoon,” Chohlis told school board members. UCISD Communications Director Ann Marie Espinoza “will be preparing communication to send out to make everyone aware throughout our community, and UCISD will have counselors available for students and staff.”

Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell told the Express-News that Justice Department officials also called her to let her know about the impending report release. She said she was surprised that the news got out because DOJ wanted the matter kept “top secret.”

Mitchell, who is conducting a separate criminal investigation into the shooting and the botched police response to it, said there has been little coordination between the DOJ and her office.

“I would like to have had a more detailed and timely notice that they were releasing the report this week,” Mitchell said. “I have asked for an in-person meeting Attorney General (Merrick) Garland prior to their scheduled press conference on Thursday, and I’m waiting for a response.”

IO May 24, 2022, high school dropout Salvador Ramos, 18, shot his grandmother in the face and took her pickup, crashing it in a drainage ditch by Robb Elementary before jumping a perimeter fence armed with an AR-15-style rifle. He shot at the school before entering through an unlocked side door. He then went into a fourth-grade classroom — which was connected by an inside door to a second classroom — and sprayed teachers and students with gunfire.

During the rampage, he killed 19 students and two of their teachers, shooting most of them in the first several minutes after entering the classrooms.

Nearly 400 officers from local, state and federal law enforcement agencies responded, but they did not enter the classroom where the shooter was holed up for more than 70 minutes with dead and wounded students and teachers.

A team of six officers that included members of the Border Patrol’s tactical unit eventually confronted and killed the shooter.

Some officers told investigators after the school shooting that they were unsure whether Ramos was an active shooter, which would have required a faster police response, or a barricaded suspect, which would have called for a more methodical approach.

In the wake of the massacre, Garland announced June 8, 2022, that he had opened a federal investigation at the request of then- Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin. McLaughlin stepped down as mayor in July to run for the state House seat in District 80.

At the time, Garland also announced that the DOJ’s Uvalde investigators would include John Mina, who was the sheriff of Orange County, Fla., when the Pulse nightclub mass shooting erupted in Orlando in June 2016, and Kristen Ziman, who was the police chief of Aurora, Colo., when a mass shooting at a movie theater occurred there in 2012.

In a closed-door session in Uvalde last April, top DOJ officials addressed relatives of the 19 children and two teachers who were killed at Robb, and some families of the 16 people who were injured.

The meeting featured Vanita Gupta, the Justice Department’s No. 3 official, who issued a public statement after an Express-News reporter showed up to the meeting but was not allowed inside.

Gupta’s statement said the goal of the department’s review was to provide an independent account of law enforcement “and other stakeholder actions and responses; identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare for and respond to active shooter events; and provide a roadmap for community safety before, during and after such incidents.”

Gupta said the review was not a criminal or civil investigation. In other words, the Justice Department isn’t looking to punish officers who may have failed in their duty that day.

“What they have relayed to me is that their report is about policies and procedures only, and not about the criminal investigation so as not to interfere with my responsibility,” Mitchell said. “However, they have failed to disclose the report to me, so I don’t know if (that) is accurate.”

The department’s Uvalde investigators have been working with 10 experts on emergency management and active-shooter response, school safety, incident command and management, tactical operations, officer safety and wellness, and victim and family support. The team is examining police policies, training, communications, deployment, incident command and tactics. It is also examining the support services provided to survivors and their families, Gupta said.

The investigators, as of April 2023, had traveled to Uvalde at least nine times and spent a total of 30 days there. They had interviewed more than 200 people, including officers, emergency and medical personnel, Uvalde school officials, victims’ family members and witnesses, Gupta said. They also interviewed Mitchell.

The department’s investigation is separate from the Texas Rangers’ year-long criminal probe into what led to the shooting, as well as officers’ slow response to the massacre, in apparent violation of active-shooter protocols.

Last June, the Rangers handed their criminal investigation to Mitchell, who initially said she might convene a grand jury by the end of 2023 to consider the case.

After six months, Mitchell said her review would continue into 2024.

“My office is still dissecting the investigation of the Texas Rangers, which is quite voluminous,” Mitchell said. “Upon our completion of the review of the Rangers investigation, we will then convene a grand jury.”

Mitchell has not said when she expects to complete her review.

At least five officers have lost their jobs over the Robb response, including two Department of Public Safety officers and Uvalde’s school police chief, Pedro “Pete” Arredondo, who was tagged as the on-site commander during the attack.