'Wrong Decision': Police Delayed Entering Scene Of Texas Shooting

UVALDE, TX — As many as 19 police officers were inside the Uvalde, Texas, elementary school where a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers, but none of the officers tried to go inside the classroom from where children made 911 calls asking to "send the police now," Steve McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, said at a news conference Friday. Law enforcement officials finally entered the classroom over an hour after the gunman began firing shots inside.

McCraw attempted to provide clarity about the police response amid criticism that police did not enter the scene sooner as bystanders urged them to do so.

Asked why police did not enter the school, McCraw said the on-scene commander determined that the situation had transitioned from an active shooter incident to a barricade situation. The commander also believed officers needed more equipment, according to McCraw.

The commander believed there were no more children at risk, McCraw said. However, there were clearly still children inside who were at risk, according to McCraw.

"From the benefit of hindsight, where I'm sitting now, of course it was not the right decision, it was the wrong decision, period," McCraw said, adding there should have been an entry sooner.

"When there's an active shooter, the rules change," he said.

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The commander was identified as the chief of police of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District.

Officials also provided more details about how the shooter entered the school and clarified that a school resource officer drove to the school when the shooting began. However, the resource officer sped up to a teacher, mistaking that person for the suspect, and drove right past the actual gunman, according to McCraw. Earlier, it was reported that the resource officer had confronted the shooter outside the school.

The gunman crashed his car outside the school at 11:28 a.m. and was killed by a Border Patrol tactical unit at 12:50 p.m.

At 12:03 p.m., nearly 20 officers were inside the elementary school hallway, McCraw said.

Between 12:03 p.m. and 12:47 p.m., there were multiple 911 calls made by children from inside the classroom where the shooting happened, informing dispatchers that multiple children were dead but that eight to nine kids were still alive, McCraw said. On one 911 call, a student called and then hung up when another student said to do so. Over a 911 call at 12:21 p.m., shots could be heard in the background.

One child who made multiple 911 calls asked to "please send the police now," a few minutes before officials finally entered the shooting scene.

The gunman, identified by officials as 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, entered the school through a door that had been propped open by a teacher. He entered the school at 11:33 a.m. and shot more than 100 rounds inside the school classrooms after firing multiple shots outside the school.

The shooter kept firing, including after the tactical Border Patrol unit arrived at the school, McCraw said.

The tactical unit got to the school at 12:15 p.m. but only entered the classroom at 12:50 p.m. and the gunman was killed. The classrooms were locked from the inside, and law enforcement officials used keys from a janitor to enter. The Border Patrol agents were also told that a person was barricaded inside and that kids were not at risk, McCraw said.