Texas School Shooting Updates: Gunman Walked Through Unlocked Door 'Unobstructed'
Source: NBC 5 DFW
Contradicting earlier reports, officials now say the 18-year-old gunman who killed 19 children and two teachers in an attack on Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, entered the school "unobstructed," through unlocked doors and did not encounter any school resource officers or other law enforcement until he was inside the building.
During a press conference Thursday, Victor Escalon, Texas DPS regional director, said that despite initial reports the gunman had been engaged by one or more armed school resource officers, he instead entered the school "unobstructed" through open doors.
The shooter was already firing at the school as he approached through the parking lot, Escalon said.
Read more: https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/national-international/live-updates-children-dead-in-mass-shooting-at-texas-elementary-school/2976868/
msongs
(67,413 posts)2naSalit
(86,646 posts)Tattletale sign that we were getting a heap of poo from authorities who screwed up and were looking to come up with the most palatable story to tell us.
Warpy
(111,270 posts)This is a red herring, in any case. All this armchair quarterbacking is ignoring the facts here. First, this country has been forced to knuckle under to a corrupt organization running largely on dirty Russian money to enact gun laws that would make absurdists blush.
Second, a barely 18 year old guy with a history of animal abuse, cutting, rages, and serious threats could buy not one but two military style weapons over the counter with no questions asked because of the crooked politicians and their absurd gun laws.
Third, you weren't there and I wasn't there and sometimes you have to trust investigators to investigate what happened in a normally peaceful rural town.
Fifth, this stuff is rare, really really rare. Putting kids into virtual prisons to keep them safe is not going to work as intended, ask any prisoner.
The only way to make this country safer is to get rid of the GUNS. We will always have people who are fucked up and hate the whole world. What we have to do is make it harder for them to take us with them when they exit it.
ck4829
(35,077 posts)groundloop
(11,519 posts)That being that a GUN shot 38 people and killed at least 21 (plus the husband of one of the victims who died of a heart attack the next day).
Lasher
(27,597 posts)We now know there was an unlocked door, a violation of protocol. And it's starting to look like this was known to others besides the killer. It matters.
Warpy
(111,270 posts)doctor appointments all the time, checking in at the principal's office. Schools are not prisons and making them so is a red herring. It won't work against a twisted punk with a SEMIAUTO RIFLE.
Lasher
(27,597 posts)The don't normally sneak them out through an unlocked back door.
It might have gone just as you say, with him shooting out the lock. Maybe not. But the fact remains, the unlocked door was a protocol violation and that matters. Somebody broke the rule, and we need to know who that was.
LT Barclay
(2,605 posts)womanofthehills
(8,718 posts)You need to be buzzed in. Schools might need to install heavy duty steal doors.
Evolve Dammit
(16,736 posts)Warpy
(111,270 posts)PSPS
(13,601 posts)Warpy
(111,270 posts)which has a lot more firepower than those little TV popguns do.
Anyway, I think I recall Mythbusters taking that one on and finding out locks were pretty easy pickings for projectiles, tougher for homemade explosives.
Lasher
(27,597 posts)A DPS representative on Wednesday said a school resource officer had engaged with the suspect before he went in the school.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/26/us/uvalde-texas-elementary-school-shooting-thursday/index.html
LiberalFighter
(50,943 posts)ck4829
(35,077 posts)dalton99a
(81,515 posts)The Wielding Truth
(11,415 posts)nowforever
(302 posts)They are fully equipped and have a strategy for schools with training they brag about. 40% of town's budget is allotted to the police department. Why did they just stand around???
Evolve Dammit
(16,736 posts)Bayard
(22,098 posts)The SWAT team is made up of volunteer part-timers. Doesn't make a lot of sense for emergency situations.
ManiacJoe
(10,136 posts)Full-time SWAT teams are expensive and do not get used much.
It is very common for small cities to have regular officers who make up the SWAT team on a part time basis, on call as needed, keep your issued equipment in the patrol car.
It is also very common for neighboring towns each to contribute a few officers to a "group" SWAT team that assembles when needed.
Large cities can afford to have a full time SWAT team. However, to justify the costs, the SWAT teams are frequently used for purposes that many people find questionable.
Bayard
(22,098 posts)bucolic_frolic
(43,176 posts)and now are trying to cover it up with press conferences of obfuscation and confusion
PSPS
(13,601 posts)Voltaire2
(13,061 posts)or any other security issue.
The problem is guns.