From ABC/Yahoo:
“Uvalde parents, community
members call for chief's resignation at emotional school board meeting”
(People visit a memorial at Robb
Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, on June 2, 2022, to pay their respects to
the victims killed in a school shooting.)
The parents of victims of the
Robb Elementary School shooting and other members of the community called for
the resignation of embattled school district Police Chief Pete Arredondo at an
emotional meeting of the Uvalde, Texas, school board Monday night. The board's
monthly meeting came nearly a month after the attack that took the lives of 19
students and two teachers. "Having Pete still employed, knowing he is
incapable of decision-making that saves lives is terrifying," said Brett
Cross, the uncle of student Uziyah Garcia, who died in the shooting.
"Innocence doesn't hide, innocence doesn't change its story, but innocence
did die on May 24."
Scores of law enforcement
officers responded to the shooting on May 24, with 19 of them waiting 77
minutes in the hallway outside the classroom containing the gunman, after
Arredondo, the incident commander, wrongly believed that the situation had
transitioned from an active shooter to a barricaded subject, law enforcement
has said. "At one point or another you're going to have to draw a line in
the sand to decide if you hold one of your own accountable," said Jesus
Rizo Jr. "Pete, Mr. Arredondo, is also my friend. I'm sure we all got
along with him. At one point or another, we're going to have to decide if we
hold them accountable. And I pray that you make the right decision."
"Not a single responding
officer ever hesitated, even for a moment, to put themselves at risk to save
the children," Arredondo told The Texas Tribune on June 9. "We
responded to the information that we had and had to adjust to whatever we faced.
Our objective was to save as many lives as we could, and the extraction of the
students from the classrooms by all that were involved saved over 500 of our
Uvalde students and teachers before we gained access to the shooter and
eliminated the threat."
Uvalde school board meetings
typically allow up to 15 minutes total for public comment, but board members
expanded the timetable for Monday's meeting. A number of attendees held
"Fire Pete Arredondo" signs as they stood at the side of the
auditorium. Among those at the meeting was Lyliana Garcia, 16, who lost both
her parents as a result of the attack. Her mother was Irma Garcia, one of the
teachers who died during the shooting, and her father was Joe Garcia, who died
of a heart attack two days later. "The horrifying manner in which my
mother was murdered and taken from us completely shattered our hearts, but made
my dad's stop," Garcia said. "There shouldn't have been a reason my
mom didn't come home that day." Garcia said she's now trying to fill the
shoes of both parents -- a burden no one her age should have. "The table
we once sat at with absolute joy and laughter is now quiet and has two empty
seats," she said. Uvalde School District officials have not responded to
multiple questions from ABC News regarding Arredondo's employment status. Uvalde
parents, community members call for chief's resignation at emotional school
board meeting originally appeared on abcnews.go.com
^ The fact that he is still in
office is a disgrace to the memory of those murdered children and 2 Teachers
while he waited outside. The fact that the School Board has done little to
nothing since the shooting shows how the authorities are working hard to
cover-up their own mistakes and inactions. It seems the only way the Victims
and their Families will get any answers and closure will be from the Federal Government
– just like it took the Federal Border Patrol to go inside the School and stop
the shooting while the Local and State Police were outside threatening to arrest
the Families listening to children being butchered. ^
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/uvalde-parents-community-members-call-023000372.html
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