CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – In an emotionally charged courtroom, relatives of the victims from the Uvalde, Texas, elementary school tragedy were visibly devastated as they heard the heart-wrenching 911 calls on the trial’s opening day. The trial focuses on a police officer accused of inadequate response to the attack, failing to protect the children.
The prosecution revealed that Adrian Gonzales, a former school officer, reached the scene just before the shooter entered the school. Despite a teacher pointing out the shooter’s location in the parking lot, Gonzales allegedly did not intervene, as explained by the prosecutor on Tuesday.
According to special prosecutor Bill Turner, Gonzales only entered Robb Elementary after the attack had already taken place, a point made clear in his opening remarks.
Jurors were cautioned by the presiding judge and attorneys about the emotional intensity of the testimony and visual evidence they were about to witness. Testimonies from the families of the victims are anticipated as the trial progresses.
As the session commenced, tissues were offered to the grieving families, who were visibly distressed when the initial emergency calls were played. Their sorrow intensified as the chilling details of the event emerged through the audio.
In defense, lawyers argued that Gonzales, one of the two officers indicted for the 2022 incident, was not passive. They claimed he called for backup and assisted in evacuating children as more officers arrived on the scene.
“The government makes it want to seem like he just sat there,” said defense attorney Nico LaHood. “He did what he could, with what he knew at the time.”
Prosecutors focused sharply on Gonzales’ steps in the minutes after the shooting began and as the first officers arrived. They did not address the hundreds of other local, state and federal officers who arrived and waited more than an hour to confront the gunman, who was eventually killed by a tactical team of officers.
Gonzales has pleaded not guilty to child abandonment or endangerment and could be sentenced to a maximum of two years in prison if convicted.
Witness testimony will resume Thursday morning.
Students grabbed scissors to confront attacker
Defense attorneys said Tuesday that Gonzales was focused on assessing where the gunman was while also thinking he was being fired on without protection against a high-powered rifle.
“This isn’t a man waiting around. This isn’t a man failing to act,” defense attorney Jason Goss said.
Gonzales and former Uvalde schools Police Chief Pete Arredondo are the only two officers to face criminal charges over the response. Arredondo’s trial has not been scheduled.
Gonzales, a 10-year veteran of the police force, had extensive active shooter training, the special prosecutor said.
“When a child calls 911, we have a right to expect a response,” Turner said, his voice trembling with emotion.
As Gonzales waited outside, children and teachers hid inside darkened classrooms and grabbed scissors “to confront a gunman,” Turner said. “They did as they had been trained.”
Families question why more officers weren’t charged
It’s rare for an officer to be criminally charged with not doing more to save lives.
“He could have stopped him, but he didn’t want to be the target,” said Velma Lisa Duran, sister of teacher Irma Garcia, who was among the 19 students and two teachers who were killed.
Some families of the victims have voiced anger that more officers were not charged given that nearly 400 federal, state and local officers converged on the school soon after the attack.
An investigation found 77 minutes passed from the time authorities arrived until they breached the classroom and killed Salvador Ramos, who was obsessed with violence and notoriety leading up to the shooting.
Reviews found many failures with police response
State and federal reviews of the shooting cited cascading problems in law enforcement training, communication, leadership and technology, and questioned why officers waited so long.
The officer’s attorneys told jurors that there was plenty of blame to go around — from the lack of security at the school to police policy — and that prosecutors will try to play on their emotions by showing photos from the scene.
“What the prosecution wants you to do is get mad at Adrian. They are going to try to play on your emotions,” Goss said.
“The monster who hurt these children is dead,” he said.
Prosecutors likely will face a high bar to win a conviction. A Florida sheriff’s deputy was acquitted by a jury after being charged with failing to confront the shooter in the Parkland, Florida, school massacre in 2018 — the first such prosecution in the U.S. for an on-campus shooting.
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Vertuno reported from Austin, Texas. Associated Press journalists Nicholas Ingram in Corpus Christi, Texas; Juan A. Lozano in Houston; and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, contributed.
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