Families of the victims killed in the 2022 Robb elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, are calling for further accountability following the indictment of the former Uvalde school police chief.
Speaking to NBC after Pete Arredondo, as well as former police officer Adrian Gonzales, were indicted on multiple counts of felony child endangerment and abandonment, the victims’ families are saying that “there’s nothing to be happy about”.
“It’s still a sad moment. There’s nothing to be happy about,” one family member, Berlinda Arreola, told NBC. Arreola’s 10-year-old granddaughter, Amerie Jo Garza, was among the 19 children and two teachers killed in the shooting on 24 May 2022 that left an additional 17 people injured.
“We are having to relive this nightmare again knowing they had the chance to save some of our loved ones – maybe all of them,” Arreola said, adding that she wants more officials to be indicted following the “cascading failures”, as described by the justice department, in the police’s delayed response to the shooting.
Jesse Rizo, the uncle of 9-year-old Jacklyn Cazares, who was killed in the shooting, echoed similar sentiments to NBC.
“My brother’s thought is, why only two people? It’s a very valid question, why only two individuals that were indicted today? And we hope that we get that answer soon,” Rizo said, adding: “I don’t think it’s enough … It’s hard to swallow. You had children that went through a lot, that saw living hell, that took their last breath on their own, the only comfort they had was each other and perhaps even themselves.”
“So, when you see these charges and the maximum penalty only carries a few years in jail, possibly … it’s difficult to accept that,” Rizo said.
Similarly, Kimberly Rubio, the mother of 10-year-old Alexandria Aniyah Rubio, who was killed in the shooting, said: “I am glad to see that some action was taken. But I don’t want it mistaken for justice. This isn’t justice. This is just the beginning. Justice would be convictions.”
“It’s two indictments out of so many possibilities. There were dozens of officers that arrived there early that knew that children were in the classroom, knew that there was an active shooter and they chose to do nothing. It is not enough, it’ll never be enough,” Rubio added.
Brett Cross, the father of 10-year-old Uziyah Garcia, who was killed in the shooting, told NBC that the indictments were “two out of 376% justice”, in reference to the 376 police officers who arrived on scene and took more than 70 minutes to apprehend the 18-year-old gunman who opened fire in a fourth grade classroom.
“It shouldn’t end with just these two,” said Cross, adding that he wants to see charges against the other police officers “that were in the hallway, the ones that knew the information, the ones that knew that there were children in there and then they didn’t do anything”.
Following the release of a federal report on the shooting earlier this year, US attorney general Merrick Garland said that “the law enforcement response at Robb elementary school … and then the hours and days after, was a failure that should not have happened”.
In its report, the justice department said that authorities had “demonstrated no urgency” and had a series of mishaps including a “haphazard” initial response, delays in setting up a command post, and not immediately addressing the attack as an active shooter situation.
Surveillance footage released by the Austin American-Statesman and local television channel KVUE in 2022 show officers in the hallway but not taking action to stop the shooter; a video showed a man wearing a vest that said “sheriff” using a hand-sanitizing dispenser on the wall of the school hallway.
In May, the victims’ families filed wrongful-death lawsuits against Instagram, Call of Duty game maker Activision, as well as weapons manufacturer Daniel Defense. The lawsuits accuse the companies of enabling the shooting, with Josh Koskoff, an attorney for the families, saying: “There is a direct line between the conduct of these companies and the Uvalde shooting.”
Speaking about the shooter who was killed by police, Koskoff said: “Well before he was old enough to purchase [an AR-15 made by Daniel Defense 23 minutes after midnight on his 18th birthday], he was targeted and cultivated online by Instagram, Activision and Daniel Defense,” Koskoff said.
“This three-headed monster knowingly exposed him to the weapon, conditioned him to see it as a tool to solve his problems and trained him to use it,” Koskoff added.
