The shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, last May changed the conversation about gun violence in the United States again in some ways: 19 fourth grade students and two teachers were killed in one of the deadliest school shootings in US history .
But what made the Uvalde attack extraordinary was not just the death toll. It was the fact that more than 370 agents from local, state and federal agencies responded to the scene — some standing in the hallway of the school — but allowed the gunman to lock himself in with students inside the school for 77 minutes before storming in. to kill him.
In the aftermath, that left a host of questions, not just about the laws governing access to guns, but about police training, emergency response, school safety and preparedness, and who would ultimately be held responsible for a failure that happened on so many levels.
In the year since the attack, a number of people have resigned or lost their jobs. New laws have been debated and some passed. Criminal investigations have been opened. Survivors underwent months of physical therapy.
Those who did not survive are buried.
Has any of it made another mass shooting less likely? In Uvalde people have had their doubts.
“We are now almost a year later and frankly nothing has changed,” Jesse Rizo, the uncle of one of the victims of the massacre, told the Uvalde school board in the weeks before the anniversary of the shooting on Wednesday.
The attack on May 24
The gunman climbed a low fence and entered the school through what turned out to be an unlocked door at about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, while students in classrooms, mainly rooms 111 and 112, were watching movies. Within minutes, several officers, including Small School Police Chief Pete Arredondo, arrived and followed the sound of gunfire to the two classrooms. Two officers were fired upon as they approached one of the classroom doors and retreated.
Mr. Arredondo made the decision not to treat the situation as an active shooting, but as a barricaded incident, and it was decided to wait until a heavily armed Border Patrol tactical team arrived with better equipment to force their way into the classroom.
Steven McCraw, the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, immediately placed most of the blame on Mr. Arredondo for the delay, but a special report from the Texas House Committee on the shooting found that the failure was “systemic,” and noted that dozens of officers were there and they did not act, even when children from classrooms called 911.
Would a quicker police response have saved lives? There is still no clear answer to that question. The victims suffered horrific injuries and most of them appear to have died instantly. But some died on the way to hospital and in a final footnote in the report, the commission concluded: “It is plausible that some victims could have survived had they not had to wait” for rescue.
Several people have lost their jobs
Mr. Arredondo was one of the first to go, when the school board unanimously voted to fire him in August, to the sound of cheers and clapping in the packed school auditorium. Lawyers for Mr Arredondo, who have said officers were reasonably focused on preventing the bloodshed from spreading to other classrooms, called his firing “an unconstitutional public lynching”.
The school district later dismantled its entire police force, which consisted of five officers, and is still in the process of renewing new employees.
The city police didn’t emerge unchanged either: The lieutenant in charge on May 24 while the police chief was on vacation, Mariano Pargas Jr., resigned in mid-November after 18 years on the force.
And under pressure from the families of the 21 victims, Hal Harrell, the school’s superintendent, retired in the fall. His interim replacement was Gary Patterson, a former San Antonio superintendent.
The Texas Department of Public Safety, the state law enforcement agency to which the Texas Rangers belong, has also taken steps to incapacitate at least two of the seven officers under investigation for their role in the response, including Sgt. Juan Maldonado and a Texas Ranger, Christopher Ryan Kindell, though some of those investigations are still pending.
The local district attorney, Christina Mitchell, is still investigating whether criminal charges should be brought against one of the police responders. Ms. Mitchell has said she intends to present any evidence of criminal misconduct to a grand jury. No decision is expected for months.
Investigations are also ongoing by the Ministry of Justice and the city of Uvalde, which have hired an independent investigator.
“Everyone who was there that day needs to be held accountable,” Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin said.
Changes in police training and equipment
The reaction of officers in Uvalde has been widely condemned. But it hasn’t led to immediate changes in how Texas police officers are trained. Last July, Mr. McCraw, the state’s public safety director, said his agency would provide “proper training and guidance on recognizing and overcoming bad command decisions on an active shooting scene.”
But several police experts said creating that kind of training posed a challenge because revoking orders from an incident commander went against the orientation of most police departments. And the state has yet to roll out new training based on last year’s guideline.
Meanwhile, the focus was on increased security measures and better equipment. In Uvalde, the local police now have additional ballistic shields and helmets, as well as new tools to breach barricaded doors. In schools in Uvalde, school administrators installed new 8-foot fences, sensors that would alert staff if a door was not properly locked, and more security cameras to monitor activity outside all schools.
Robb Elementary is being demolished
The school where the attack took place is behind a wire mesh fence and the windows are boarded up, and will be demolished once the lawsuits and ongoing investigations are completed. Ms. Mitchell, the district attorney, and the families of many victims are among those taking legal action to block the school’s demolition until it is no longer necessary to gather evidence at the crime scene. Mr Patterson, the interim superintendent, said there are plans for a permanent memorial but it has not yet been decided what and where it would be.
A new elementary school will be built three miles from where Robb Elementary now sits. The new school, which has not yet been named, is scheduled to open its doors in 2024, said Eulalio Diaz Jr., a member of an advisory committee overseeing planning for the new campus. Early designs include the colors of papel picado, the traditional Mexican folk art with multicolored sheets of paper – in recognition of the Hispanic culture that has long been a big part of Uvalde, and the families at Robb Elementary.
For now, Robb Elementary students are scattered among other schools.
Changes in gun laws
Texas took steps to expand access to firearms in the year following the shooting.
Months before the attack, Texas lawmakers abolished permit requirements for carrying handguns. After the attack, the state also effectively lowered the age required for carrying a gun from 21 to 18, once officials stopped defending the higher age limit in court in December.
There was some slight movement in the legislature in early May, when a bill that would have raised the age to buy an AR-15-style rifle from 21 to 18 was voted favorably in a House committee. The legislation may have prevented the 18-year-old gunman in Uvalde from purchasing the gun he used in the massacre.
But the bill missed a major deadline and failed to get a vote in the full Texas House.
Elsewhere in the country there has been a mixed record of gun control laws since Uvalde, with access limited or expanded depending on which party is in control.
Washington state, where Democrats control the state government, last month became at least the ninth state to join efforts to prevent the distribution of AR-15s and other high-powered rifles commonly used by mass shooters, following its previous lead from states like California, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Republicans have moved in the opposite direction, with lawmakers in several states introducing legislation to expand the ability to carry concealed weapons without a license and eliminate things like gun-free zones.
Last summer, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would have reinstated a federal ban on assault weapons, but it stalled in the Senate.
Last summer, Congress also passed a new federal gun law that brought together the often-divided legislature spurred by the Uvalde tragedy. Democrats and just enough Republicans approved a measure that improves background checks for potential gun buyers under 21, allowing law enforcement to review juvenile records, including mental health records, as young as 16. President Biden signed it into law.
The law also provides millions of dollars for states to implement red flag laws, toughens laws against buying straw and gun trafficking, and provides funding for intervention in mental health crises.
Gun violence activists, including the Uvalde families, said they plan to return to Washington, D.C., to lobby for a total ban on assault weapons.
J. David Goodman reporting contributed.