Uvalde School Police Chief Pete Arredondo (third from left) stands during a news conference outside Robb Elementary School on May 26, 2022, in Uvalde, Texas.
Pete Arredondo, the former police chief for Uvalde’s school district, has refused to watch videos from bodycam footage from the day of the mass shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers.
“It’s difficult for me to see that,” he told CNN in an interview that aired Friday. “These are my children too. People understand that. We went down the hallways every day and stressed about keeping the doors locked, stressed about being vigilant, and the less I see of those that I don’t have to, the better for me.”
This is the first time Arredondo has spoken since being indicted for child endangerment in June and pleading guilty. He told CNN he has been “scapegoated” for the police’s failed response to the 2022 mass shooting at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas.
Arredondo, who was the designated incident commander that day, was on scene with nearly 400 other police officers who waited 77 minutes to confront and kill the shooter. The justice department reported that the police’s response that day had “cascading failures.”
Arredondo also told CNN that he doesn’t recall being told that there were students alive in the classroom with the shooter. Fourth grader Khloie Torres called 911 from inside the classroom and told the 911 operator to “please hurry” because “there’s a lot of dead bodies.” Arredondo said he learned about Khloie’s call three days after the mass shooting. However, bodycam footage shows that the call was relayed over police officers’ radios, but that Arredondo was talking over it.
While Steven McCraw, director of Texas Department of Public Safety, said Arredondo was the incident commander that day, Arredondo said DPS officers should have set up an incident command post and taken control of the scene. According to the indictment against Arredondo , Arredondo made decisions that slowed the police response to stop the gunman, including failing to identify an active shooting and not following his police training.
“I know we did the best we could with what we had,” he told CNN.
Arredondo’s lawyer, who sat with him during the interview, said there “was not a coward on scene” that day.
Arredondo said being a police officer is his “passion,” and he’s hoping to earn people’s trust again.
“It’s sad I’ve lost it based on lies and deception and deceptive statements and narratives that were incorrect,” he said.
Brett Cross, whose 10-year-old son, Uziyah, was murdered in the mass shooting, criticized CNN on social media for giving Arredondo a platform to share his side of the story.
On Saturday, more 911 calls were released after The Associated Press and other news organizations sued the city of Uvalde to release them.
“Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry!” one teacher told a 911 operator through tears before hanging up.
The shooter’s uncle, Armando Ramos, also called 911 and begged to speak to his nephew, arguing that the shooter would stop if he told him to.
“Everything I tell him, he does listen to me,” Ramos said. “Maybe he could stand down or do something to turn himself in,” he added, his voice cracking.
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