Robb Elementary Crime Scene: 911 Calls, 77-Minute Delay, and Charges

The Robb Elementary crime scene spanned two adjoining classrooms, 111 and 112, where an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 students and two teachers on May 24, 2022, while law enforcement waited in the hallway outside for 77 minutes. What investigators later documented inside those rooms, the 911 calls placed by children still alive among the dead, and the body camera footage finally released in 2025 have driven every legal proceeding tied to one of the deadliest school shootings in American history.

What Happened Inside Classrooms 111 and 112

The two rooms were connected by interior double doors. Teacher Arnie Reyes was in classroom 111 with eleven students. Teachers Irma Garcia and Eva Mireles were in classroom 112 with their students.¹ Salvador Ramos entered both rooms within a minute of arriving at the school, reportedly telling victims “Goodnight” before opening fire. Between 11:37 a.m. and 11:44 a.m., he fired 142 of the 315 cartridges he had brought inside, firing more than 100 rounds in his first minutes in the classrooms.²

All eleven students in classroom 111 were killed. Reyes was the only survivor. In classroom 112, six students and both teachers were killed.¹

The weapon was a Daniel Defense DDM4, one of two AR-15-style rifles Ramos had legally purchased from a federally licensed Uvalde dealer in the week before the shooting.³ The injuries were catastrophic. Eulalio “Lalo” Diaz Jr., the local justice of the peace serving as de facto coroner, described the victims as having “small, ravaged bodies” and said the high-velocity rounds caused extreme damage to “children with small bones and limbs.” A trauma surgeon quoted in reporting compared the wounds to what a grenade would produce.⁴ The Bexar County Medical Examiner assisted with identification, which was not finalized until 2:00 p.m. the following day. All deaths were ruled homicides.⁵

What Investigators Documented at the Scene

Crime scene photographs presented during the January 2026 trial of former officer Adrian Gonzales offered the most detailed public account of the aftermath. Former Texas Ranger Juan Torrez walked jurors through images from Room 111 that showed large pools of blood, drag marks left by first responders who had moved victims, and dried bloodstains on desks, textbooks, and office supplies. Shell casings, many covered in blood, were scattered throughout. Investigators had placed pink and yellow rods in bullet cavities to map the trajectory of gunfire, which indicated the shooter likely fired downward through desks where children were hiding.⁶ The photographs did not show bodies, which had been removed before the images were taken. Judge Sid Harle overruled defense objections to the graphic images and warned the courtroom gallery that the photographs were “shocking and gruesome.”

Texas Ranger Lieutenant Brent Barina testified about the broader school grounds. He identified a single bullet hole on an exterior structure near the playground, the only physical evidence of shots fired in the direction of children who had been outside. When Barina entered Room 111 after the shooting, the only body remaining was the gunman’s. In Room 112, he described “a lot of death,” with a concentration of deceased children and one adult in the northwest corner.⁷

The scene was complicated by the movement of victims during triage. Bodies were ultimately found in four different rooms because first responders had relocated them while trying to separate the dead from the wounded. One victim was on a gurney, and one teacher died in an ambulance at the scene.⁵ The Department of Justice later found that “non-investigatory personnel entered the hallway and classrooms 111/112 for the purpose of viewing the scene,” compromising the integrity of the physical evidence.⁸

The 911 Calls From Inside Classroom 112

While the gunman was still inside, two surviving students placed 911 calls that became central evidence. At 12:10 p.m., ten-year-old Khloie Torres called from her teacher’s cell phone and whispered, “I’m in classroom 112… Please hurry. There is a lot of dead bodies.” Over several calls, she reported that her teacher, Eva Mireles, had been shot but was still alive. At 12:36 p.m., she called again: “Can you tell the police to come to my room?”⁹ Student Miah Cerrillo also took over one of the calls, asking “Can you please send help?” and telling the dispatcher “He’s shooting” when gunfire erupted again at 12:21 p.m.

Information from these calls was relayed to officers on the scene. At 12:12 p.m., a dispatcher announced over radio that a child was on the line inside a “room full of victims.” According to subsequent investigations, this intelligence should have ended any hesitation about whether the shooter was still actively threatening children.⁹

Why Police Waited 77 Minutes

The U.S. Department of Justice released its comprehensive review on January 18, 2024, after analyzing over 14,000 pieces of evidence and conducting more than 260 interviews over 54 days of onsite work.¹⁰ Attorney General Merrick B. Garland characterized the response as a failure of “leadership, training, and policies.”

The central finding was that officers on scene shifted from treating the event as an active shooter situation to treating it as a barricaded-subject scenario. That misclassification had catastrophic consequences. Standard active-shooter protocol calls for officers to move toward the threat immediately, even without specialized equipment. Instead, responders spent the 77-minute gap clearing other classrooms, requesting SWAT tools, and searching for keys to rooms 111 and 112.¹¹ The shooter fired 45 additional rounds in the presence of law enforcement during that delay.¹²

Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo, who became the de facto on-scene commander, discarded his radios upon arriving and relied on cell phones and verbal communication. On multiple occasions he directed officers who were preparing to breach the classrooms to stop. No incident command post, staging area, or clear perimeter was ever established, leaving arriving personnel confused about who was in charge. Emergency medical responders struggled to identify leadership, and ambulances were obstructed by improperly placed law enforcement vehicles. Over 370 officers from local, state, and federal agencies eventually responded, including 188 U.S. Customs and Border Protection personnel.¹³ At 12:50 p.m., a U.S. Border Patrol tactical unit breached the classroom door and killed the gunman.¹⁴

The UCISD also disseminated false information in the immediate aftermath, including a social media post claiming students were safe. Family members were later notified of deaths by personnel who lacked training in delivering such news.¹²

The Body Camera Footage Release

On August 12, 2025, Uvalde County released nearly seven hours of body-worn camera footage and 1,576 pages of documents, the final batch of records that local authorities had withheld. The release came after a yearslong legal battle initiated by KSAT 12 News and other media organizations, resolved when a state appeals court ruled in favor of disclosure.¹⁴

The footage captured officers standing in the hallway while the shooter remained inside, the eventual breach, and the removal of victims. Audio includes an officer saying “You ready to catch somebody?” minutes before the breach and others calling out “Watch the kids” and “There’s a lot of blood in there.” The county blurred victims’ images in the released footage. Families of the victims supported the disclosure.

Criminal Charges Against Officers

Only two officers among the roughly 380 who responded have faced criminal charges. Legal experts have noted that Supreme Court precedent holding that officers generally lack a constitutional duty to protect individuals creates a difficult burden for prosecutors.¹⁵

Adrian Gonzales Acquitted

Former Uvalde CISD police officer Adrian Gonzales was charged with 29 counts of child endangerment, one for each of the 19 children killed and 10 injured. His trial began on January 6, 2026, in Corpus Christi after being moved from Uvalde to secure an impartial jury. Prosecutors alleged that Gonzales, one of the first officers on scene, waited approximately three and a half minutes before entering the school hallway and failed to engage, distract, or delay the shooter despite receiving information about the gunman’s location from a teaching aide.¹⁶ The defense argued Gonzales never saw the gunman and acted reasonably based on limited information.

On January 21, 2026, after more than seven hours of deliberation, the jury acquitted Gonzales of all 29 counts. Defense attorney Nico LaHood said jurors he spoke with were “saddened” but acquitted because of “a lot of gaps in the evidence, and some of it didn’t make sense.”¹⁷

Pete Arredondo Awaiting Trial

Former UCISD Police Chief Pete Arredondo was indicted in June 2024 on 10 counts of abandoning or endangering a child.¹⁵ He has pleaded not guilty and maintains he followed his training, disputing his characterization as the incident commander. Judge Sid Harle has set a tentative trial date of February 22, 2027, with a venue change from Uvalde expected.¹⁸

The timeline is complicated by a separate legal fight over testimony from U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents. Both Arredondo’s defense team and Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell have filed federal lawsuits to compel three CBP agents, including two who killed the gunman and one who was in the hallway, to testify. CBP has resisted, arguing the testimony is unnecessary and could compromise sensitive law enforcement procedures and national security. Arredondo’s attorney, Paul Looney, estimates the litigation could take another eight months to a year to resolve.¹³

Civil Settlements and Pending Lawsuits

In April 2025, the Uvalde City Council unanimously approved a $2 million settlement with 19 families, funded through the city’s insurance. The agreement also required the city to implement fitness-for-duty standards for police officers, improve emergency training, designate May 24 as an annual Day of Remembrance, erect a permanent downtown memorial, and continue supporting mental health services.¹⁹ Uvalde County separately settled for $2 million under similar terms.²⁰

Litigation continues against the Texas Department of Public Safety and 92 individual DPS officers who were present during the shooting. Families have also sued the Uvalde Consolidated School District and individual employees.

In a separate action filed on the second anniversary, families sued Daniel Defense (manufacturer of the rifle), Meta (which operates Instagram), and Activision (maker of the Call of Duty franchise), alleging the companies marketed firearms to minors and “conditioned” the shooter through social media and gaming.²¹ As of mid-2025, Meta and Activision were seeking dismissal on First Amendment and Communications Decency Act grounds, with rulings pending. The case against Daniel Defense remains active.²²

What Happened to the Building

The Uvalde school board voted to demolish Robb Elementary in early June 2022, but District Attorney Christina Mitchell requested a delay, arguing that the grand jury might need access to the building’s physical layout to contextualize evidence. “Once the building is gone, that opportunity is permanently lost,” she said.²³ The building has remained standing and shuttered. The $60 million Legacy Elementary School was built to replace it and opened to roughly 600 students in the fall of 2025.²⁴

1
ABC News. Inside Robb Elementary School Families Victims Survivors Recount
2
ABC News. Timeline Shooting Texas Elementary School
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Texas Tribune. Uvalde Shooter Bought Gun Legally
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NPR. A Uvalde Coroner Is Haunted by Identifying the Bodies
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ASPR TRACIE. Fatality Management in Rural Areas – Uvalde School Shooting
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ABC News. Uvalde Jurors Shown Graphic Photos of Classroom Where Students Were Killed
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KSAT. Day 4 Brings First Week of Former Uvalde CISD Police Officers Child Endangerment Trial to a Close
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ABC News. DOJ Report Uvalde Shooting Cites Cascading Failures
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CNN. Uvalde 911 Classroom Calls
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U.S. Department of Justice. Justice Department Releases Report on Critical Incident Review
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COPS Office. Uvalde Critical Incident Review
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U.S. Department of Justice COPS Office. Critical Incident Review – Active Shooter at Robb Elementary School
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Texas Tribune. CBP Pete Arredondo Lawsuit Uvalde School Shooting Trial
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KSAT. Body Worn Camera Footage Released by Uvalde County Shows Chaos Around Robb Classroom Breach
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Texas Tribune. Texas Uvalde School Shooting Police Chief Arredondo Indictment
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Houston Public Media. Jury Acquits Former Uvalde School Officer
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ABC News. Uvalde Trial Verdict Reached in Case of Former School Police
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ABC News. Former Uvalde School Police Chief Set for Court
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CNN. Uvalde School Shooting Settlement
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Houston Public Media. Uvalde Families Sue Texas DPS, Settle With City and County
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ABC News. Uvalde Families Sue Makers of AR-15 and Call of Duty
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Spectrum Local News. Lawyer Argues Meta Can’t Be Held Liable for Gunmakers Posts
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ABC News. Plans to Demolish Robb Elementary Moving Forward
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Spectrum Local News. Legacy Elementary Welcomes Students, Honors Robb Victims