11 a.m. update
UVALDE, Texas — A gunman who killed 19 children and two teachers at a Texas elementary school in one of the deadliest school massacres in U.S. history barricaded himself inside a fourth-grade classroom, where all the fatalities and injuries occurred, a state official said Wednesday.
“The shooter was able to make entry into the classroom, barricaded himself inside that classroom and again just began shooting numerous children and teachers that were in that classroom,” Lt. Christopher Olivarez, a Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman, said on NBC’s “Today” show.
Separately, Olivarez told CNN that all those who were killed and injured were in that room.
Police and border patrol officers shattered the school’s windows, Olivarez said on “Today,” in an attempt to offer students and teachers an escape route.
The massacre in the predominantly working-class Latino city of about 16,000 people, roughly 50 miles from the Mexico border, involved the most fatalities of any U.S. school shooting since 2012, when 20 children and six adults were killed at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn.
Two teachers were among the dead, and several children were injured in the massacre, including a 10-year-old who remained in critical condition.
The gunman, whom officials identified as Salvador Ramos, an 18-year-old who attended a nearby high school, was fatally shot at the scene.
After shooting and wounding his 66-year-old grandmother at her home in Uvalde, Ramos got into his SUV and then crashed it into a ditch before arriving at the elementary school, according to a law-enforcement source. Clad in black and reportedly wearing body armor, the gunman was captured on a security camera with at least one weapon visible as he approached the school.
The children at Robb Elementary School were two days away from their summer break when the attacker burst into their classroom. Tuesday’s theme at the school was “Footloose and Fancy,” and students were supposed to wear special outfits with fun or fancy shoes.
Among the victims was Amerie Jo Garza, 10. Just that morning, she had posed at school for a photo, smiling as she clutched a bright certificate celebrating her “A-B” honor roll.
“Thank you everyone for the prayers and help trying to find my baby,” her father, Angel Garza, wrote on Facebook shortly after midnight. “She’s been found. My little love is now flying high with the angels above. Please don’t take a second for granted. Hug your family. Tell them you love them. I love you Amerie Jo. Watch over your baby brother for me.”
Henry Becerra, a pastor with City Church, which is based in Los Angeles and San Antonio, traveled to Uvalde after the shooting to pray with families overnight and into Wednesday morning.
After meeting them at the civic center, Becerra went to some of their homes to pray with relatives in living rooms as mourners spilled into the yards.
“How many more moments of silence do we have to go through?” Becerra said as he stood with a half-dozen members of his church outside the civic center late Tuesday.
“The last few days, the vulnerable people have been taken advantage of: a grocery store, a church and a school,” he said, alluding to recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Laguna Niguel, in Southern California.
“We need to take action,” Becerra said, but “I don’t have an answer.”
Becerra said he saw families in the civic center being notified that their children had died in the attack.
“They screamed, they cried, they pulled their hair, they yelled, ‘Why?’” he said.
Uvalde’s mayor, Don McLaughlin, asked for prayers for the families of those who lost their lives so “God could surround them with his love and comfort.”
“My heart is broken for them all,” he said in a Facebook post early Wednesday. “To our community — I know your hearts are broken.”
Rev. Mike Marsh of St. Philips Episcopal Church in Uvalde, who met at the local hospital Tuesday with relatives of those unaccounted for, said local funeral homes planned to cover funeral costs. He said the city was paying for the burials, and a community memorial was planned at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the nearby fairgrounds.
“There’s going to be a lot of emotional trauma for students, teachers and parents that needs to be addressed,” he said. “There’s no good answers.”
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10 a.m. update
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The 18-year-old gunman who slaughtered 19 children and two teachers at a Texas elementary school barricaded himself inside a single classroom and “began shooting anyone that was in his way,” authorities said Wednesday in detailing the latest mass killing to rock the U.S.
Law enforcement officers eventually broke into the classroom and killed the gunman. Police and others responding to Tuesday’s attack also went around breaking windows at the school to enable students and teachers to escape, Lt. Christopher Olivarez of the Texas Department of Public Safety said Wednesday on NBC’s “Today.”
Olivarez told CNN that all the victims were in the same fourth-grade classroom at Robb Elementary.
The killer “barricaded himself by locking the door and just started shooting children and teachers that were inside that classroom,” he said. “It just shows you the complete evil of the shooter.”
Investigators did not immediately disclose a motive but identified the assailant as Salvador Ramos, a resident of the community about 85 miles (135 kilometers) west of San Antonio. Olivarez said investigators were working with the FBI and looking at social media to see if there were any “red flags” before the shooting.
Ramos had hinted on social media that an attack could be coming, according to state Sen. Roland Gutierrez, who said he had been briefed by state police. He said that the gunman “suggested the kids should watch out” and that he had bought two “assault weapons” after turning 18.
Investigators believe Ramos posted photos on Instagram of two guns he used in the shooting.
The attack in the heavily Latino town of Uvalde was the deadliest shooting at a U.S. school since a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, in December 2012.
Families waited hours for word on their children. At the town civic center where some gathered Tuesday night, the silence was broken repeatedly by screams and wails. “No! Please, no!” one man yelled as he embraced another man.
“My heart is broken today,” said Hal Harrell, school district superintendent. “We’re a small community, and we’re going to need your prayers to get through this.”
Adolfo Cruz, a 69-year-old air conditioning repairman, was still outside the school as the sun set, seeking word on his 10-year-old great-granddaughter, Eliajha Cruz Torres.
He drove to the scene after receiving a terrifying call from his daughter about the first reports of the shooting. Waiting, he said, was the heaviest moment of his life.
“I hope she is alive,” Cruz said.
On Wednesday morning, volunteers were seen arriving at the community center with Bibles and therapy dogs.
The attack was the latest in a seemingly unending string of mass killings at churches, schools, stores and other sites in the United States. Just 10 days earlier, 10 Black people were shot to death in a racist rampage at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket.
In a somber address to the nation hours after the bloodshed in Uvalde, President Joe Biden pleaded for new gun restrictions.
“As a nation we have to ask: When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby? When in God’s name are we going to do what has to be done?” Biden asked. “Why are we willing to live with this carnage?”
But the prospects for any reform of the nation’s gun regulations appeared dim. Repeated attempts over the years to expand background checks and enact other curbs on guns have run into Republican resistance in Congress.
Before the attack, Ramos shot and wounded his grandmother, then fled the scene, crashing his car at the school and making his way inside, authorities said.
Olivarez said the gunman “just began shooting numerous children and teachers that were in that classroom, having no regard for human life. … Just began shooting anyone that was in his way.”
He said a tactical team forced its way into the classroom, and “they were met with gunfire as well, but they were able to shoot and kill that suspect.’’
Earlier, a law enforcement official said one Border Patrol agent who was working nearby when the shooting began rushed into the school without waiting for backup and shot and killed the gunman. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about it.
The agent was wounded but able to walk out of the school, the law enforcement official said.
Jason Owens, a top regional official with the Border Patrol, said some area agents have children at Robb Elementary.
“It hit home for everybody,” he said.
Staff members in scrubs and devastated victims’ relatives could be seen weeping as they walked out of Uvalde Memorial Hospital, which said 13 children were taken there. Another hospital reported a 66-year-old woman was in critical condition.
Uvalde, home to about 16,000 people, is about 75 miles (120 kilometers) from the border with Mexico. Robb Elementary, which has nearly 600 students in second, third and fourth grades, is in a mostly residential neighborhood of modest homes.
The attack came as the school was counting down to the last days of the school year with a series of themed days. Tuesday was to be “Footloose and Fancy,” with students wearing nice outfits.
Law enforcement officers investigating the bloodshed began serving search warrants and gathering telephone and other records. They also sought to contact Ramos’ relatives and trace the guns.
Condolences poured in from leaders around the world. Pope Francis pleaded that it was time say “‘enough’ to the indiscriminate trade of weapons!” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said his nation also knows “the pain of losing innocent young lives.”
Texas, which has some of the most gun-friendly laws in the nation, has been the site of some of the deadliest shootings in the U.S. over the past five years.
In 2018, a gunman killed 10 people at Santa Fe High School in the Houston area. A year before that, a gunman shot more than two dozen people to death during a Sunday service in the small town of Sutherland Springs. In 2019, a gunman at a Walmart in El Paso killed 23 people in a racist attack targeting Hispanics.
The shooting came days before the National Rifle Association annual convention was set to begin in Houston. Gov. Greg. Abbott and both of Texas’ U.S. senators were among elected GOP officials who were the scheduled speakers at a Friday leadership forum sponsored by the NRA’s lobbying arm.
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This story was first published on May 24, 2022. It was corrected to reflect that state Sen. Roland Gutierrez said the gunman shot his grandmother before going to the school; he did not say the gunman killed his grandmother. It was also updated to correct the spelling of the name of the 10-year-old great-granddaughter.
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Eugene Garcia and Dario Lopez-Mills in Uvalde, Jake Bleiberg in Dallas, Ben Fox, Michael Balsamo and Eric Tucker in Washington, Paul J. Weber in Austin, Juan Lozano in Houston, Gene Johnson in Seattle and Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.
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More on the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings
9:20 a.m. update
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — UVALDE, Texas — Uvalde community members arrived early Wednesday at a civic center where families learned the fate of their loved ones the night before. Volunteers arrived with Bibles and therapy dogs.
A minister says he prayed with families of victims in a hospital waiting room after a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers inside an elementary school classroom in Texas.
Uvalde Memorial Hospital said 13 children were taken there. Another hospital reported a 66-year-old woman was in critical condition.
Pastor Doug Swimmer of the nondenominational Potters House Church told ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Wednesday that Uvalde is a tight-knit community where people know their neighbors and see them every day.
Asked what he said to people whose faith may have been shaken by the mass shooting, Swimmer said “I know that one thing that we as Texans understand is that God is still God … he is able to bring comfort in times of distress.”
8:36 a.m. update
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — A law enforcement official says all those killed at a Texas elementary school were in the same classroom.
Texas Department of Public Safety Lt. Christopher Olivarez tells CNN that all victims were in the same fourth-grade classroom at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde. That’s about 85 miles west of San Antonio.
Nineteen children and two teachers were killed in Tuesday’s shooting.
Authorities say the 18-year-old shooter is also dead.
7:11 a.m. update
Families mourn, worry in wake of elementary school shooting
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — Distraught families gathered at a local civic center and turned to social media to mourn and to make desperate pleas for help finding missing children as the death toll in a gruesome school shooting at a Texas elementary school rose to at least 19 students. Authorities said the gunman also killed two adults.
By nightfall, names of those killed during Tuesday’s attack at Robb Elementary School in the town of Uvalde began to emerge. One man at the civic center walked away sobbing into his phone “she is gone.” On the backside of the building, a woman stood by herself, alternately crying and yelling into her phone, shaking her fist and stamping her feet.
Manny Renfro said he got word Tuesday that his grandson, 8-year-old Uziyah Garcia, was among those killed.
“The sweetest little boy that I’ve ever known,” Renfro said. “I’m not just saying that because he was my grandkid.”
Renfro said Uziyah last visited him in San Angelo during spring break.
“We started throwing the football together and I was teaching him pass patterns. Such a fast little boy and he could catch a ball so good,” Renfro said. “There were certain plays that I would call that he would remember and he would do it exactly like we practiced.”
Fourth-grade teacher Eva Mireles, 44, was remembered as a loving mother and wife.
“She was adventurous. I would definitely say those wonderful things about her. She is definitely going to be very missed,” said 34-year-old relative Amber Ybarra, of San Antonio.
Ybarra prepared to give blood for the wounded and pondered how no one noticed trouble with the shooter in time to stop him.
“To me, it’s more about raising mental health awareness,” said Ybarra, a wellness coach who attended the elementary school where the shooting happened. “Someone could possibly have seen a dramatic change before something like this happened.”
Lisa Garza, 54, of Arlington, Texas, mourned the death of her cousin, Xavier Javier Lopez, who had been eagerly awaiting a summer of swimming.
“He was just a loving 10-year-old little boy, just enjoying life, not knowing that this tragedy was going to happen today,” she said. “He was very bubbly, loved to dance with his brothers, his mom. This has just taken a toll on all of us.”
She also lamented what she described as lax gun laws.
“We should have more restrictions, especially if these kids are not in their right state of mind and all they want to do is just hurt people, especially innocent children going to the schools,” Garza said.
On social media, pictures of smiling children were posted, their families begging for information. Classes had been winding down for the year and each school day had a theme. Tuesday’s was Footloose and Fancy. Students were supposed to wear a nice outfit with fun or fancy shoes.
Adolfo Cruz, a 69-year-old air conditioning repairman, remained outside the school Tuesday night, waiting for word about his 10-year-old great-granddaughter, Eliajha Cruz Torres, whose whereabouts remained unknown to family.
Cruz drove to the scene after receiving a tearful and terrifying call from his daughter shortly after the first reports that an 18-year-old gunman had opened fire at the school. While he waited outside the school Tuesday night, his family was at the hospital and civic center waiting for any potential word on her condition.
Çruz called the waiting the heaviest moment of his life.
“I hope she is alive,” Cruz said. “They are waiting for an update.”
Federico Torres waited for news about his 10-year-old son Rogelio. He told KHOU-TV that he was at work when he learned about the shooting and rushed to the school.
“They sent us to the hospital, to the civic center, to the hospital and here again, nothing, not even in San Antonio,” Torres said. “They don’t tell us anything, only a photo, wait, hope that everything is well.”
Torres said he was praying that “my son is found safe … Please if you know anything, let us know.”
Hillcrest Memorial Funeral Home, which is located across the street from Robb Elementary School, said in a Facebook post on Tuesday evening that it would be assisting families of the shooting victims with no cost for funerals.
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Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas. Jamie Stengle contributed from Dallas.
ORIGINAL STORY
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — An 18-year-old gunman killed 19 children and two adults as he went from classroom to classroom at a Texas elementary school, officials said, adding to a gruesome, yearslong series of mass killings at churches, schools and stores.
The attacker was killed by a Border Patrol agent who rushed into the school without waiting for backup, according to a law enforcement official.
Tuesday’s assault at Robb Elementary School in the heavily Latino town of Uvalde was the deadliest shooting at a U.S. school since a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, in December 2012.
Hours after the attack, families were still awaiting word on their children. At the town civic center where some gathered, the silence was broken repeatedly by screams and wailing. “No! Please, no!” one man yelled as he embraced another man.
“My heart is broken today,” said Hal Harrell, the school district superintendent. “We’re a small community, and we’re going to need your prayers to get through this.”
Gov. Greg Abbott said one of the two adults killed was a teacher.
Adolfo Cruz, a 69-year-old air conditioning repairman, was still outside the school as the sun set, seeking word on his 10-year-old great-granddaughter, Eliajha Cruz Torres.
He drove to the scene after receiving a terrifying call from his daughter shortly following the first reports of the shooting. He said other relatives were at the hospital and the civic center.
Waiting, he said, was the heaviest moment of his life.
“I hope she is alive,” Cruz said.
The attack was the latest grim moment for a country scarred by a string of massacres, coming just 10 days after a deadly, racist rampage at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket. And the prospects for any reform of the nation’s gun regulations seemed as dim, if not dimmer, than in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook deaths.
But President Joe Biden appeared ready for a fight, calling for new gun restrictions in an address to the nation hours after the attack.
“As a nation we have to ask, when in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby? When in God’s name are we going to do what has to be done?” Biden asked. “Why are we willing to live with this carnage?”
It was not immediately clear how many people in all were wounded, but Uvalde Police Chief Pete Arredondo said there were “several injuries.”
Staff members in scrubs and devastated victims’ relatives could be seen weeping as they walked out of Uvalde Memorial Hospital, which said 13 children were taken there. Another hospital reported a 66-year-old woman was in critical condition.
Officials did not immediately reveal a motive, but they identified the assailant as Salvador Ramos, a resident of the community about 85 miles (135 kilometers) west of San Antonio. Law enforcement officials said he acted alone.
Uvalde, home to about 16,000 people, is about 75 miles (120 kilometers) from the border with Mexico. Robb Elementary, which has nearly 600 students in second, third and fourth grades, is in a mostly residential neighborhood of modest homes.
The attack came as the school was counting down to the last days of the school year with a series of themed days. Tuesday was to be “Footloose and Fancy,” with students wearing nice outfits.
Ramos had hinted on social media that an attack could be coming, according to state Sen. Roland Gutierrez, who said he had been briefed by state police. He noted that the gunman “suggested the kids should watch out,” and that he had bought two “assault weapons” after turning 18.
Before heading to the school, Ramos shot his grandmother, Gutierrez said.
Other officials said that the grandmother survived and was being treated, though her condition was not known.
Investigators believe Ramos posted photos on Instagram of two guns he used in the shooting, and they were examining whether he made statements online in the hours before the assault, a law enforcement official said.
Law enforcement officers were serving multiple search warrants Tuesday night and gathering telephone and other records, the official said. Investigators were also attempting to contact Ramos’ relatives and were tracing the firearms.
The official could not discuss details of the investigation publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The attack began about 11:30 a.m., when the gunman crashed his car outside the school and ran into the building, according to Travis Considine, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety. A resident who heard the crash called 911, and two local police officers exchanged gunfire with the shooter.
Both officers were shot. It was not immediately clear where on the campus that confrontation occurred or how much time elapsed before more authorities arrived on the scene.
One Border Patrol agent who was working nearby when the shooting began rushed into the school without waiting for backup and shot and killed the gunman, who was behind a barricade, according to a law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about it.
The agent was wounded but able to walk out of the school, the law enforcement official said.
Meanwhile, teams of Border Patrol agents raced to the school, including 10 to 15 members of a SWAT-like tactical and counterterrorism unit, said Jason Owens, a top regional official with the Border Patrol.
He said some area agents have children at Robb Elementary.
“It hit home for everybody,” he said.
Condolences poured in from leaders around the world. Pope Francis pleaded that it was time say “‘enough’ to the indiscriminate trade of weapons!” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba of Ukraine, which is at war with Russia after Moscow invaded, said that his nation also knows “the pain of losing innocent young lives.”
The tragedy in Uvalde was the deadliest school shooting in Texas history, and it added to a grim tally in the state, which has been the site of some of the deadliest shootings in the U.S. over the past five years.
In 2018, a gunman fatally shot 10 people at Santa Fe High School in the Houston area. A year before that, a gunman at a Texas church killed more than two dozen people during a Sunday service in the small town of Sutherland Springs. In 2019, another gunman at a Walmart in El Paso killed 23 people in a racist attack targeting Hispanics.
The shooting came days before the National Rifle Association annual convention was set to begin in Houston. Abbott and both of Texas’ U.S. senators were among elected Republican officials who were the scheduled speakers at a Friday leadership forum sponsored by the NRA’s lobbying arm.
In the years since Sandy Hook, the gun control debate in Congress has waxed and waned. Efforts by lawmakers to change U.S. gun policies in any significant way have consistently faced roadblocks from Republicans and the influence of outside groups such as the NRA.
A year after Sandy Hook, Sens. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, and Patrick J. Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, negotiated a bipartisan proposal to expand the nation’s background check system. But the measure failed in a Senate vote, without enough support to clear a 60-vote filibuster hurdle.
Last year, the House passed two bills to expand background checks on firearms purchases. One bill would have closed a loophole for private and online sales. The other would have extended the background check review period. Both languished in the 50-50 Senate, where Democrats need at least 10 Republican votes to overcome objections from a filibuster.
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This story was first published on May 24, 2022. It was corrected to reflect that state Sen. Roland Gutierrez said the gunman shot his grandmother before going to the school; he did not say the gunman killed his grandmother. It was also updated to correct the spelling of the name of the 10-year-old great-granddaughter.
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Eugene Garcia and Dario Lopez-Mills in Uvalde, Jake Bleiberg in Dallas, Ben Fox, Michael Balsamo and Eric Tucker in Washington, Paul J. Weber in Austin, Juan Lozano in Houston, Gene Johnson in Seattle and Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.
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More on the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings
