Uvalde Grand Jury to Consider Charges Against Officers

A grand jury was impaneled Friday in Uvalde County, Texas, to consider whether charges should be levied against law enforcement officers regarding their response to the 2022 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School that left 19 students and two teachers dead.

The grand jury reportedly is expected to cover much of the same evidence revealed in a report issued Thursday by the Department of Justice (DOJ), in which Attorney General Merrick Garland called the response by law enforcement and officials in the hours and days after “a failure.”

Since the shooting, at least five officers have lost their jobs, including two from the Texas Department of Public Safety and the on-site commander, Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo. But no one has been charged in the criminal investigation that was led by the Texas Rangers, a division of the TDPS. The DOJ report said the FBI has assisted the Rangers but is not doing its own criminal investigation.

“My office continues to methodically and systematically dissect the Texas Rangers investigation of which I have possessed for less than a year,” Christina Mitchell, the district attorney who handles Uvalde County, told the Uvalde Leader-News.

“I want to ensure that our efforts in this process are careful, deliberate, and fair. I am continuously mindful of my responsibility to the victims, their families, to those under a cloud of accusation and to our community.

“From the beginning, I committed to protect the integrity of the Texas Rangers investigation and to present the investigation to an Uvalde County grand jury.”

It is unknown what charges the officers could face, but they include child endangerment, the Austin American-Statesman reported. Under Texas law, a person commits the offense of child endangerment if they “intentionally, knowingly, recklessly or with criminal negligence” place a child 15 or younger “in imminent danger of death.” All of the students killed were between 9 and 11 years old.

Multiple failures have been cited in the response of law enforcement — including, city, state, and federal officers — to the incident, with breakdowns in leadership, decision-making, tactics, policy, and training.

The DOJ report said although several of the first officers on the scene “initially acted consistent with generally accepted practices to try to engage the [shooter], once they retreated after being met with gunfire, the law enforcement responders began treating the incident as a barricaded subject scenario rather than as an active shooter situation.”

The report said there was a 77-minute gap between when officers first arrived on the scene and when they confronted and killed the shooter, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos.

The American-Statesman reported Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin said Monday he was frustrated by the pace of the investigations.

“They don’t have answers to simple questions they should have,” McLaughlin said of the families.