Three years after AJ Martinez was shot in his right thigh as he hid under a pile of backpacks at an elementary school in Uvalde — the Texas city that suffered one of the nation’s deadliest school shootings — his road to recovery remains arduous and long.
Currently 13 and in eighth grade, he continues to endure daily pain from the shrapnel embedded in his right leg, the back of his shoulders and the rear of his head. Now, his mother said, the families of the victims, including the 19 students and two teachers who were killed, are mentally preparing for another phase of the tragedy: the first of two criminal trials over the much-derided police response at Robb Elementary School.
On Monday, jury selection is set to begin in Corpus Christi, Texas, for the trial of Adrian Gonzales, one of the first officers to arrive at the scene of the massacre where a teenage gunman killed 19 children and two teachers. In October, a judge approved a change of venue, after lawyers for Mr. Gonzales argued that it would be nearly impossible to find an impartial jury in Uvalde.
Kassandra Martinez, AJ’s mother, said she and her son expected to attend part of the trial and were praying for some sort of accountability.
“If not, it would be a slap to his face, because he survived this and that officer did not go in,” said Ms. Martinez, 35, referring to Mr. Gonzales. “His friends and his teachers might still be here.”
Pete Arredondo, the former school district police chief, who was identified in various investigations as the effective incident commander on scene, is expected to be tried next.
Two years after the shooting, a grand jury indicted the two officers — there were more than 370 who were involved to one degree or another in the police response that day — on charges of abandoning and endangering a child. They were the only criminal charges to stem from the shooting and its aftermath. Many other officers have resigned or been fired.
Nico LaHood, a lawyer for Mr. Gonzales and a former district attorney for Bexar County, Texas, has said the district attorney who filed the charges has not explained to him why his client has been “singled out” among the hundreds of officers who responded that day. He said that his client felt he was innocent of the charges.
The Uvalde District Attorney, Christina Mitchell, declined to comment on Friday.
The massacre that sent shock waves across the nation took place on May 24, 2022, when an 18-year-old gunman armed with an AR-15-style rifle made his way into two connected classrooms and terrorized fourth-grade students and their teachers. About 77 minutes elapsed before a tactical team, led by federal Border Patrol agents, confronted and killed the gunman, after the many responding police officers from a variety of agencies waited outside in the hallway and outside the campus.
A series of state and federal investigations have all concluded that a cascade of failures in leadership, decision making, tactics, policy and training led to the much criticized police response.
Mr. Gonzales is facing a total of 29 counts. According to the indictment, he was one of the first to arrive at the scene and was aware of the gunman’s location. He did not “engage, distract and delay the shooter, and failed to otherwise act to impede the shooter until after the shooter entered Rooms 111 and 112 of Robb Elementary School,” the indictment added.
Mr. Arredondo, who was in charge of the six-person police department with jurisdiction over schools in the Uvalde school district, is facing 10 counts of abandoning and endangering a child. He has been accused of deciding that the gunman was no longer an active shooter but a barricaded subject, a decision that will be central to his upcoming trial.
The school district has released dozens of hours of police body camera footage that showed Mr. Arredondo trying in vain for more than 30 minutes to negotiate with the gunman, who was still inside two connected classrooms.
At one point, he is heard saying, “We don’t want anyone else hurt, sir. These are innocent children, sir.”
The jury in Mr. Gonzales’ case is expected to hear from investigators, review many hours of police body camera footage and hear from some of the families of the victims and survivors.
Oscar Orona, whose son Noah was wounded on his back and played dead to survive the shooting, said he could not comment on the case because he was expected to take the stand. He added that his focus was on his son’s well-being.
“We still live our lives day to day. Noah is doing well in school and, God willing, will be an incoming freshman next year,” Mr. Orona said. “We are hopeful that he continues on his path to healing, but we never forget about the terrible ordeal he experienced. We continue to rely on our faith in God for guidance.”
The convictions of officers who fail to follow protocols for mass shootings remain rare. A jury in Parkland, Fla., in the trial of a former sheriff’s deputy, Scot Peterson — who was also charged with child neglect and other crimes for not confronting the gunman who killed 17 people at a high school in 2018 — found him not guilty.
Ms. Martinez, AJ’s mother, said she and her son wanted to be present when a verdict was read to begin feeling some sort of closure.
“I want him to be there so he can hear guilty or not guilty,” she said. “It won’t be easy, but it’s easier to face it when it happens.”
As for his recovery, AJ is expected to get further testing to see if doctors can remove shrapnel stuck in his leg so that he can walk easier.
“He won’t be 100 percent at all, but he’s trying,” Ms. Martinez said. “We hope we at least we get justice.”
Edgar Sandoval covers Texas for The Times, with a focus on the Latino community and the border with Mexico. He is based in San Antonio.
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