The Department of Justice has appointed an expert panel to conduct an investigation into the response by Uvalde police officers to the Robb Elementary School shooting on May 24.
The panel of nine comprises experts in active shooter response, school safety, incident command, and victim support. Among its members is Gene Deisinger, the retired Deputy Chief of the Virginia Tech Police Department, who was on duty during the 2007 shooting at the university’s campus that killed 32.
The panel also includes Florida’s Orange County Sheriff John Mina, whose department has investigated a series of high-profile shootings in his jurisdiction, and Kirsten Ziman, former Chief of the Aurora, Ill. police department, which responded to the town’s 2019 shooting that killed six.
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the investigation on Wednesday. He said that the department would be conducting a “critical incident review” of the shooting and the police response. Such reviews have become standard procedure after mass shootings across the country and were notably conducted after the 2015 shooting in San Bernadino, Calif, that killed 16 and the Pulse Nightclub shooting in Orlando, Fla., that killed 49 – both of which were ISIS-motivated. The review is not criminal in nature.
Commenting on the process, Garland said that “we can assess what happened and we can make recommendations for the future.” Per the Justice Department, the panel of experts will be interviewing the “victims, families, school officials, government officials, and law enforcement” to understand the police response that day, which would include “site visits”.
The outcome of the investigation will be a public report issued by the Justice Department, which will support the panel’s work through the Community Oriented Policing Services office.
The review comes as the response by Uvalde Police Department and the Uvalde school district’s in-house police officers is facing heavy criticism. An ongoing investigation by the Texas Department of Public Safety has revealed that, shortly after the shooter entered the school building, up to 19 officers arrived on scene but did not breach the two connected classrooms where he carried out his rampage.
At the time, several children were still alive inside the classrooms and placed calls to 911, pleading for help. These calls were relayed over police radio via Uvalde Police dispatch, but were not received by the incident commander, school district police Chief Peter Arredondo, who did not possess a Uvalde Police Department radio at the time. Arredondo, therefore, made the assumption that all children inside the classrooms were dead, and chose to wait for tactical support – leaving the shooter alone with the children for nearly 47 minutes.
Only at 12:50 p.m. did a U.S. Border Patrol tactical team breach the classroom and kill the shooter. They faced difficulty entering initially, as they did not have a key, and had to borrow one from the school’s janitor.
Arredondo’s decision was widely criticized. Texas Rangers’ Director Steve McCraw said “it was the wrong decision,” while Texas Governor Greg Abbott said he was “absolutely livid” about it. It is unclear whether Arredondo’s decision not to breach the classroom earlier lead to the deaths of children inside. Amidst the criticism, the Uvalde Police Department and school district have reportedly stopped cooperating with the Texas DPS investigation.
The federal investigation comes after several officials requested that the FBI begin a probe into police conduct during the incident. Representative Joaquin Castro (D., Texas) wrote a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray requesting that an investigation be launched – a call echoed by Representative Tony Gonzalez (D., Texas) of the 23rd District, which covers Uvalde. Garland stated that the Justice Department’s ongoing review had been requested by Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin (R., Texas), which prompted him to order it. The FBI, however, will not be involved.
Separately, in his statement on Wednesday, Garland also said that the DOJ “is ready to participate to support the bipartisan gun safety negotiations” currently being conducted in the Senate.
Lawmakers in the upper chamber have been working to craft legislation on gun safety that will gain the 60 votes needed to avoid a filibuster, led by Senator John Cornyn (R., Texas). It comes as the House of Representatives passed a raft of strict gun control measures on Wednesday – which raised the federal age to buy semi-automatic weapons to 21 and outlawed large-capacity magazines – though these are not expected to become law.