A Uvalde County grand jury indicted fired school district police chief Pete Arredondo and another district police officer more than two years after a mass shooting that left two teachers and 19 students dead. The two ex-cops face charges of abandoning or endangering a child.
Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell launched a grand jury investigation into the delayed response by law enforcement officials during the May 24, 2022, shooting at Robb Elementary School, the San Antonio Express-News reported. Local, state, and federal law enforcement officials received sharp criticism following the delayed response to the active shooter situation.
The grand jury evaluated the circumstances surrounding the shooting and the 77 minutes it took for the shooter to be eliminated to determine if any of the nearly 400 law enforcement officers involved in the response should face criminal charges.
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The first two indictments came down on Thursday, charging fired Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police Chief Pete Arrandondo and Officer Adrian Gonzalez with abandoning or endangering a child.
It is not clear if any other law enforcement officials will face criminal charges in connection to the police response.
Arredondo faces ten counts of child endangerment, the Express-News stated. He turned himself in at the Uvalde County Jail on Thursday afternoon.
Gonzalez faces 29 counts of child endangerment. The charges are for the 19 children who died during the shooting and one for each of the ten survivors who suffered physical or psychological injuries, the report states.
Earlier this week, the 12 members of the grand jury toured the shuttered elementary school where the mass-casualty shooting took place more than two years ago.
Texas State Senator Roland Gutierrez (D) expressed outrage that only two officers were indicted.
“If they’re going to indict those two officers, they need to indict the 13 DPS troopers in that hallway,” Gutierrez said in an interview, the Express-News reported. “That’s very disturbing to me.”
District Attorney Mitchell responded, saying, “They met for six months. They took a hard look at the case and were very deliberate and thoughtful in all their deliberations.”
Bob Price is the Breitbart Texas-Border team’s associate editor and senior news contributor. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday morning talk show. He also serves as president of Blue Wonder Gun Care Products.