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Uvalde Chief Resigns From City Council 07/03 08:41
(AP) -- The Uvalde school district's police chief has stepped down from his
position in the City Council just weeks after being sworn in following
allegations that he erred in his response to the mass shooting at Robb
Elementary School that left 19 students and two teachers dead.
Chief Pete Arredondo said in a letter dated Friday that he has decided to
step down for the good of the city and "to minimize further distractions." He
was elected to the council on May 7 and was sworn in on May 31, just a week
after the massacre, in a closed-door ceremony.
"The mayor, the city council, and the city staff must continue to move
forward to unite our community once again," Arredondo said in his resignation,
first reported by the Uvalde Leader-News.
Arredondo, who has been on administrative leave from his school district
position since June 22, has declined repeated requests for comment from The
Associated Press. His attorney, George Hyde, did not immediately respond to
emailed requests for comment Saturday.
On June 21, the City Council voted unanimously to deny Arredondo a leave of
absence from appearing at public meetings. Relatives of the shooting victims
had pleaded with city leaders to fire him.
The Uvalde City Council released Arredondo's resignation letter Saturday,
after city officials received notification of his intent to step down via
email, but did not comment further.
Representatives of Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin have not responded to AP's
requests for comment.
Col. Steven McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, told
a state Senate hearing last month that Arredondo -- the on-site commander --
made "terrible decisions" as the massacre unfolded on May 24 , and that the
police response was an "abject failure."
Three minutes after 18-year-old Salvador Ramos entered the school,
sufficient armed law enforcement were on scene to stop the gunman, McCraw
testified. Yet police officers armed with rifles stood and waited in a school
hallway for more than an hour while the gunman carried out the massacre. The
classroom door could not be locked from the inside, but there is no indication
officers tried to open the door while the gunman was inside, McCraw said.
McCraw has said parents begged police outside the school to move in and
students inside the classroom repeatedly pleaded with 911 operators for help
while more than a dozen officers waited in a hallway. Officers from other
agencies urged Arredondo to let them move in because children were in danger.
"The only thing stopping a hallway of dedicated officers from entering room
111 and 112 was the on-scene commander who decided to place the lives of
officers before the lives of children," McCraw said.
Arredondo has tried to defend his actions, telling the Texas Tribune that he
didn't consider himself the commander in charge of operations and that he
assumed someone else had taken control of the law enforcement response. He said
he didn't have his police and campus radios but that he used his cellphone to
call for tactical gear, a sniper and the classroom keys.
It's still not clear why it took so long for police to enter the classroom,
how they communicated with each other during the attack, and what their body
cameras show.
Officials have declined to release more details, citing the investigation.
Arredondo, 50, grew up in Uvalde and has spent much of his nearly 30-year
career in law enforcement in the city.
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