Texas officials had contradictory accounts of Uvalde school shooting

Texas officials had contradictory accounts of Uvalde school shooting | USA TODAY

Texas officials, including Governor Greg Abbott, offered contradictory narratives over two days after the school shooting in Uvalde that left 19 students and 2 teachers dead.

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With the attacker locked inside, a commanding officer decided this was no longer an active shooter situation, according to Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw. Instead, officers treated the shooter as a barricaded subject, a judgment that may have contributed to the decision not to break into the classroom immediately. “It was the wrong decision. Period," McCraw said. "There's no excuse for that."

Seventy-nine minutes passed between the time the gunman began firing outside Robb Elementary School and the moment police shot him dead. While police failed to act, 10-year-olds and their teachers were making frantic calls to 9-1-1.

Between bouts of tears, McCraw acknowledged that the decision was not only wrong but catastrophic. Having as many as 19 officers wait in a school hallway for more officers and equipment while students and teachers called 9-1-1 from inside the classroom could have cost lives.