On Thursday, officials briefed the media and updated the timeline of the events leading up to the horrific massacre at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, on Tuesday. Nineteen children and two teachers were slaughtered by 18-year-old Salvador Ramos.
Victor Escalon, South Texas regional director of the Department of Public Safety, told reporters that “there’s a lot of information, a lot of moving parts” to the investigation. “We want to know what happened, recreate the scene. That takes days, that takes hours, that takes time.”
He noted that Texas Rangers are heading the investigation into the shooting, assisted by ATF, FBI, CBP, and the Uvalde County District Attorney’s Office.
Here’s the latest account of events from Texas authorities (all times Central).
11:01 am: Ramos calls a girl in Germany he had met online and tells her he loves her.
11:21 am: Twenty minutes later, he texts the teen girl, saying that he had shot his grandmother and plans to “shoot up a(n) elementary school.” Police say Ramos shot his grandmother in the face. She is in serious condition at a San Antonio hospital.
11:28 am: Law-enforcement officials receive the first 911 call reporting a crash involving what was later identified as Ramos’ vehicle. Initially, officials had said they received a report of a crashed vehicle and a man in body armor carrying a rifle eight minutes earlier, at 11:20 a.m.
Related: UVALDE: What the Hell Were Cops Doing Outside While Kids Were Being Slaughtered in the School?
Ramos exits the passenger side of the car, heads in the direction of a funeral home across the street, and begins firing shots at people in the parking lot there. No one was injured in that shooting.
Ramos then heads to Robb Elementary School and hops the fence adjacent to the west entrance.
11:40 am: Ramos enters the school unimpeded and begins firing. “Numerous rounds are discharged at the school,” said Escalon.
Steve McCraw, the Texas director of public safety, claimed on Wednesday that an armed school security officer “encountered” Ramos but did not exchange gunfire with him. He said at the time that the officer followed Ramos into the school and “rounds were exchanged.” According to Escalon, that information was “not accurate.” He said that, based on video obtained by officials, the shooter “walked in unobstructed, initially” and fired upward of 25 rounds when he first entered the building.
For the next few minutes, Ramos walks the halls of the school and enters an adjoining classroom connected by open doors. He barricades himself in the rooms with children and two teachers. It’s not known how Ramos managed to barricade himself in the classroom. “We’re still trying to establish if there was any type of locking mechanism on the doorway from inside the classroom,” Escalon said.
11:43 am: Three minutes later, Robb Elementary School announces it is going on lockdown, and Uvalde Police post a note on its Facebook page advising people to avoid the area of the school.
11:44 am: Four minutes after Ramos entered the building, law enforcement officials arrive at the school and make entry. “They hear gunfire, they take rounds, they move back to get cover, and during that time they approach the place where the suspect is at,” said Escalon. “According to the information I have [Ramos] went in at 11:40, he walked approximately 20 feet, 30 feet. He makes a right. He walks through the hallway, he makes a right, walks another 20 feet, turns left into a schoolroom, into a classroom that has doors open in the middle.”
“Officers are there, the initial officers that received gunfire,” he explained. “They don’t make entry initially because of the gunfire they’re receiving, but we have officers calling for additional resources, anybody that’s in the initial area: tactical teams, we need equipment, we need specialty equipment, we need body armor. We need precision riflemen [and] negotiators. So during this time that they’re making those calls to bring in help—to solve this problem and stop it immediately—they’re also evacuating personnel. When I say personnel, students, teachers. There’s a lot going on. A complex situation.”
During this time, according to Escalon, negotiators were trying to reach the shooter. “During negotiations, there wasn’t much gunfire other than trying to keep the officers at bay.” Asked by reporters whether negotiators were able to make contact with Ramos, Escalon said, “right now, according to information, he did not respond.”
Between the time Ramos entered the building and the moment he was shot, police “were taking gunfire, [conducting] negotiations, and developing a team to make entry to stop him.”
He said he could not confirm reports that parents waiting outside the police perimeter were pleading with officers to go in and rescue their children.
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12:17 pm: Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District posts messages on Facebook and Twitter alerting the community to the active-shooter situation playing out at the school.
Around 12:35 pm: “Approximately an hour later, U.S. Border tactical teams arrive. They make entry, shoot and kill the suspect,” Escalon said. “But you also had a Uvalde County deputy and Uvalde Police Department that made entry and killed the suspect. Immediately, immediately, numerous officers now charge into a rescue operation. How do we save these children? Some made it out. We don’t have a hard number yet, but that was the goal.”
1:06 pm: Nearly two hours after the initial call to police, the Uvalde Police Department posted on its Facebook page that the shooter was “in custody.”
“It is so hard. It is hard to take,” Escalon said. “It’s traumatic. We’re all hurting inside. The victims, the family members, we feel for them.”
In a press release, Uvalde Chief of Police Daniel Rodriguez asked for the community’s patience as they continue their investigation.
“It is important for our community to know that our Officers responded within minutes alongside Uvalde CISD Officers,” he wrote. “Responding UPD Officers sustained gun-shot wounds from the suspect. Our entire department is thankful that the officers did not sustain any life threatening injuries.”
“I understand questions are surfacing regarding the details of what occurred,” he added. “I know answers will not come fast enough during this trying time, but rest assured that with the completion of the full investigation, I will be able to answer all the questions that we can.”
It’s not unusual to see new facts emerge and shifting timelines in the wake of such a horrific attack. The fog of war makes it difficult to piece together a moment-by-moment account of how a situation unfolded. It will likely take weeks or even months before we know how things really transpired. Nevertheless, the information we do have raises questions about the police response to the shooting.
As we wait for more definitive answers to emerge, let’s pray for the families of the victims and the traumatized children who remain, along with law enforcement officials involved in the crisis and the investigation. They’re all hurting tonight and will need God’s grace to get them through the next weeks and months.
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