Amid two years of painful wrangling over the delayed police response to the deadly shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, the role of the federal agents who finally breached the classrooms and killed the gunman has largely avoided scrutiny.
The agents, from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, were seen as having saved the day by responding to the school and stepping in after a 77-minute delay.
But a 203-page report released on Wednesday by the agency complicated that simple narrative, finding that the border agents had been just as confused and delayed as dozens of other state and local law enforcement agents inside the school by the chaotic and mostly leaderless response.
The report, from the agency’s Office of Professional Responsibility, also offered the most detailed account yet of the tense and violent moments when federal agents finally entered the classrooms and the gunman burst from a closet and began firing at them.
And despite the agents’ central role in confronting and killing the gunman, the report raised questions about whether the dozens who responded had the legal authority to do so. The agents were insufficiently trained in responding to active shooter situations, the report found.
Its recommendations included that the agency take steps to better train its officers in active shooter responses, particularly to those in which breaching a door may be necessary, and to seek to clarify the law around how the agency interacts with state and local law enforcement during such events.
“None of the responders whom O.P.R. interviewed could cite a specific authority for being at Robb Elementary School,” the report found. “To the extent C.B.P. intends for its personnel to continue to respond to mass violence incidents in a non-federal setting, policy or law must be generated to ensure they have proper authority to do so.”
The report joined a growing list of official examinations of the shooting, carried out on May 24, 2022, by an 18-year-old gunman who killed 19 children and two teachers in two connected classrooms.
Reports on the school shooting, among the deadliest in the nation’s history, have been done by the Justice Department, the Texas House of Representatives and a local grand jury. In June, the grand jury indicted the former head of the Uvalde school police department, Pete Arredondo, and a former city officer, Adrian Gonzales, for their roles in the response.
Mr. Arredondo, who has said he did nothing wrong, is scheduled to appear in court next week on the criminal charges stemming from his management of the response.
The Customs and Border Protection report determined, as others have, that law enforcement officers from different agencies found themselves without clear direction, and divided into two groups at either end of the hallway with the gunman in classrooms in the middle. Like the other officers at the school, the federal agents took part in clearing other classrooms before trying to enter those where the gunman had opened fire.
At that point, the acting commander of the Border Patrol tactical team understood that Mr. Arredondo had been trying to negotiate with the gunman and had also ordered a master key to the classrooms to be located, according to the report.
The supervisory agent believed, as did others, that the door to the classrooms was locked, though no one checked, the report said. The officers waited for keys after deciding that other methods of entering the rooms would not have been effective, the report found.
“Guy is taking shots at the door. He has multiple children in there. Door is locked,” the acting tactical commander, identified only as a supervisory Border Patrol agent, wrote in a text around 12:28 p.m., according to the report. That was almost an hour after the gunman had first opened fire in a barrage of bullets, at 11:33 a.m.
After a key was located, the supervisory agent made the decision to go into the classrooms, the report found.
“Recognizing the futility of waiting any longer,” the report found, the supervisory agent “formed a team and entered the classroom.”
While many of the details of the police response have become widely known from previous investigations, the report included a harrowing description of what the border tactical team saw as it entered the classrooms, 111 and 112, at 12:50 p.m.
The agents, whose names were redacted from the report, opened the door to Classroom 111, propping the door open and looking around. At first there was no gunfire. A Border Patrol agent with a shield entered, followed by the supervisory agent.
“While visually clearing the blind corner, S.B.P.A. saw a pile of what appeared to be deceased people in the corner of the room,” the report said. A local sheriff’s deputy and another Border Patrol agent entered behind them.
Suddenly, as they looked around the classroom, one of the agents saw a “closet door kicked open from the inside” and the gunman emerged.
“Almost instantaneously, B.P.A. took a step back, slipped, and observed the assailant’s black hair and muzzle flashes from the assailant’s rifle,” the report said. “B.P.A. felt his shield receiving impacts from the assailant’s gunfire and returned fire with four rounds from his pistol before it malfunctioned.”
The other officers also opened fire, killing the gunman.
The report captures the extent to which the agents and officers were overwhelmed by the horror of the scene.
After the shooting stopped, the Border Patrol agent, who had been carrying the shield, entered Classroom 112 and “observed two boys with their arms raised under a sheet,” according to the report. “He pulled out the boys and sent them out of the classroom and yelled at other law enforcement officers to regain their composure.”
Some of the families of the victims and survivors said they had conflicting feelings about the findings in the new report.
Abigale Veloz, whose daughter Miah Cerrillo had covered her face with blood to hide from the gunman, said that the constant stream of new revelations was helpful because it represented transparency. But she said it also caused anxiety for her and her daughter.
Tina Quintanilla, whose daughter was evacuated from the elementary school on the day of the shooting, said it was a shame that Uvalde residents had to wait more than two years to hear about the Border Patrol’s response.
While they had been lauded as heroes for putting a stop to the gunman, she said, she also faulted the agents for also waiting too long after they arrived to take action.
“Everybody waited, everybody,” said Ms. Quintanilla, who had gone to the school in a panic to pick up her daughter that day. “I remember seeing the large amount of Uvalde officers there. It’s a shame that it took so long for this report to come out. They are a federal agency. They should had released something sooner. It’s a huge mess.”
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