The teenager who killed 19 children from an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, on Tuesday and announced his crime on social networks on the day of the tragedy, was able to go to the establishment in the first minutes without meeting any opposition, police said Thursday, in this small town with a Hispanic majority located 130 km west of San Antonio.
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Tuesday around 11:00 a.m. (local time), the killer, later identified as 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, announced “on Facebook” that he was going to “shoot” his grandmother, where he lives, according to the governor of the Texas, Greg Abbott.
Touched in the face, the 66-year-old woman can nevertheless alert the police. She will be transported in critical condition to University Health Hospital in San Antonio.
The young man, in paramilitary uniform, fled with his grandmother’s pick-up. On Facebook, he also announces that he will attack “a primary school”, according to Mr. Abbott.
After 3.5 km of road, he is the victim of an accident, for an undetermined reason, near the Robb primary school, attended by more than 500 children between 7 and 11 years old. They only had a few more school days before the end of the school year.
He exits the vehicle with an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle and a backpack full of ammunition.
He sees two people in the distance near a funeral home and shoots them, said Victor Escalon, head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, on Thursday.
At around 11:40 a.m. (local time), he then walked towards the school, climbed a gate and headed towards the west side of the establishment while firing and meeting no opposition, according to Mr. Escalon.
Contrary to what had been previously reported Salvador Ramos was not confronted with a policeman assigned to the security of the primary school when he arrived on the scene, he corrected.
Police arrived at the scene four minutes later and exchanged fire with Mr Ramos who then barricaded himself in a classroom.
The three police officers ask for reinforcement and this is where “the carnage begins”, according to Steven McCraw.
He killed 19 students, aged 9 to 10, and the two teachers present, according to the authorities.
The children’s identities have been exposed by their families who share their pain on social media.
Among them, Xavier Lopez, a 10-year-old boy who loved to dance, or Amerie Jo Garza, a little girl with a broad smile who had just turned 10.
The name of a professor was also revealed in the press.
Eva Mireles, 44, had been teaching at Uvalde for 17 years, according to her family and the primary school. Married, she was the mother of a daughter.
Here are the details of the victims.
Outside the school walls, the police break the windows of other classes and evacuate pupils and teachers.
Inside the school, the police prepare their intervention. They position themselves in the hallway and in the adjacent classroom to prevent the assailant from escaping.
About an hour after arriving at school, he was killed by an elite unit of border police — Mexico being nearly 90 km as the crow flies from Uvalde.
Salvador Ramos is an American citizen enrolled in the secondary school of Uvalde from where he had dropped out, indicated Greg Abbott. He had been living with his grandmother for two months, after arguments with his mother.
He has no juvenile criminal history or psychological issues known to local health departments, Governor Abbott said.
On May 17, the day after his 18th birthday, he had purchased a semi-automatic rifle, then ammunition, and another automatic rifle on May 20 at the same Uvalde armory, Steven McCraw said.
Investigators have so far found no evidence to explain the reason for his action, he said.
A cousin, Mia, told The Washington Post that he was “not very social” and no longer wanted to go to classes where he was bullied because of his stutter. He loved fighting video games, according to other friends.
According to CNN, he announced just before his act that he had “shot (his) grandmother in the head” and was going to “shoot in a primary school now” in a message to a young German girl he met online in early May. She did not specify which social network he used.
The 15-year-old, who lives in Frankfurt, said he was angry with his grandmother that morning because she was “on the phone with (telephone operator) AT
According to her, the young man spent a lot of time alone at home and “never had plans to go out with his friends”.
