Shooter barricaded himself in classroom, killing 19 children and 2 teachers, official says (2024)

All fatalities and injuries took place inside one classroom at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, according to Lt. Chris Olivarez, spokesperson for the Texas Department for Public Safety.

The shooter barricaded himself in one room, killing two teachers and 19 children, he said.

"Just goes to show you thecomplete evil from this shooter," Olivarez told CNN's John Berman and Shimon Prokupecz.

As the shooting was taking place, officers were going around the school, breaking windows and trying to evacuate children and staff. They were then able to force entry into the classroom where the shooter was, he said.

All the victims have been removed, identified and their families have been notified, the lieutenant said. Multiple children were wounded inside the classroom, according to Olivarez, but there is no exact number as to how many at this time.

"It'sa small classroom, you can have anywhere from25 to 30 students in there, plus there were twoteachers in there.... So don't have exact number ofhow many students were in thatclassroom, but it could vary ... Itwas a classroom setting, atypical classroom setting where youhave mass groups of childreninside that classroom alltogether, with nowhere to go," Olivarez said.

Olivarez said there was no chase with law enforcement before the shooter crashed a car near the school.

When asked if the school was a target, Olivarez said there are still "a lot of unanswered questions."

Olivarez said the shooter had one rifle inhis possession when he wentinto the school, and authorities are working todetermine what type of rifle andthe capacity.

The shooter was wearing "atactical vest carrier with noballistic panels; so typicallythose type of carriers are usedby tactical teams, SWATteams, where they can place magazines,extra ammunition inside thosecarriers and be able to move ina tactical formation," Olivarez said.

Olivarez said his grandmother — whom the shooter shot beforehand — is still alive and authorities are trying to locate his grandfather and immediate family members.

CNN's Raja Razek contributed reporting to this post.

Kim Hammond, who lives two doors down from Robb Elementary School, said at first it didn’t register that it was gunfire that she heard at the school.

“I just kind of dismissed it,” she told CNN’s John Berman. “Then my living room started to shake, and it was a helicopter, it was literally right over my house just above the tree, and I thought ‘this is not good.’”

When Hammond realized something was happening at the school, she went onto Facebook to investigate, and she saw that police were reporting a shooting at Robb Elementary.

Hammond, who is a Desert Storm veteran, knows what gunfire sounds like. She said she didn’t want to believe that it was coming from the school.

“That can’t be, not here,” she hoped. “But my mind wouldn’t even go there. I just figured somebody ran and they are having a shootout, so I’ll stay in the house and lock the doors.”

Hammond, getting emotional, said she very much looks forward to next school year when the kids will once again return to the school playing loudly at recess and loading buses.

“I’ll be happy to hear it to tell you the truth, I’ll welcome it. These kids, they need to be sheltered from it as much as they can be,” she said.

FormerRobb Elementary School PrincipalRossMcGlothlin described the school and the city of Uvalde following yesterday's mass shooting that killed 19 students and two teachers.

"We never believe that something this tragic can happen so close to us," he said to CNN's John Berman following Tuesday's mass shooting. "Robb Elementary is a great school."

McGlothlin said thatwhen he wasprincipal at the school, in 2015 and 2016, it served students in the third and fourth grades. They come from across the city ofUvalde,since the cityseparates some students by grade levels at some campuses, saidMcGlothlin.

"Uvaldeis a great little town,"McGlothlin said. "It's a quiet, friendly community, farmland to the south and ranchland to the north; it's the gateway to the Texas Hill Country."

"This is just a sad example that this absolutely can happen anywhere," he added.

David Hogg,activist and survivor of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, told CNN on Wednesday that "there is no way to process what has happened"at Robb Elementary School.

Hogg washiding in a closet during the shooting at his high school in Parkland, Florida on Feb. 14, 2018;17 people were killed.

"The reality is if I'm just talking about this, and Congress is talking about this, after there's been the equivalent of another Sandy Hook or another Parkland or another Buffalo...we are failing our children," Hogg told CNN's John Berman.

Hogg said he spent a few days with victims of the recent mass shooting in Buffaloand says there is still "shock" in that community.

The March for Our Lives co-foundertold CNN his message for action on gun violence is "first of all vote and second of all, show up at your state legislature every year demanding action on gun violence. Not just around how somebody gets a gun, but why they pick up a gun in the first place."

"If we do that, mark my words, we could cut gun violence in half in a decade," said Hogg.

Tuesday's massacre at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, is the second-deadliest school shooting since 2012, when 26 children and adultswere killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

It is at least the 30th shooting at a K-12 school in 2022, according to a CNN tally.

At least 19 children and two teachers were killed in Tuesday's mass shooting. The 18-year-old gunman is dead.

CNN's Elizabeth Wolfe, Nicole Chavez and Dakin Andone contributed reporting to this post.

Ten-year-old Xavier Lopez has been identified as one of the victims killed at Robb Elementary School, his mother Felicha Martinez confirmed to theWashington Post.

“He was funny, never serious and his smile,” Martinez said about the fourth grader, her voice breaking. “That smile I will never forget. It would always cheer anyone up.”

Just a few days shy of completing his last year of elementary school, Xavier was counting the days until he would officially move up the academic ladder into Flores Middle School in Uvalde.

His dreams seemed so close on Tuesday at Robb Elementary School’s honor roll ceremony. Martinez was there to cheer him on as Xavier’s name was called to receive his certificate.Mere hours before the tragedy, Martinez snapped a photo of Xavier.

She told him she was proud and that she loved him before hugging him goodbye. She said she did not imagine that would be the last moment she would share with her “mama’s boy.”

The father of one of the children killed in Tuesday's school shooting has identified his daughter as10-year-old Amerie Jo Garza.

Angel Garza saidon Facebookearly Wednesday morning that his daughterhad been killed in the shooting at her elementary school.

"Thank you everyone for the prayers and help trying to find my baby. She’s been found. My little love is now flying high with the angels above. Please don’t take a second for granted. Hug your family. Tell them you love them. I love you Amerie jo. Watch over your baby brother for me," said the father.

The post came hours after Angel's original post asking for help in finding the girl in the wake of the shooting. "I don’t ask for much or hardly even post on here but please It’s been 7 hours and I still haven’t heard anything on my love. 💔 Please fb help me find my daughter."

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has promised for more than a year to have a vote on two House-passed bills to expand background checks on gun sales — but he has been reluctant to force a vote on the issue knowing that they will fail, even as he has set up failed votes on other issues, like abortion and voting rights, before.

The bills are likely to get less than 50 votes — much less the 60 votes to overcome a filibuster.

It’s unclear when Schumer will try to force a procedural vote to break a filibuster. Unless there’s an agreement from all 100 senators, the earliest he could set up the procedural vote would be Saturday, according to a Democratic aide.

But senators were expected to leave for next week’s Memorial Day recess on Thursday afternoon. So they may wait until after the recess to take that procedural vote, even though leaving town amid the Texas tragedy would be bad optics.

The aide said Schumer has not indicated when he may try to force the vote yet.

French President Emmanuel Macron expressed his condolences over the Texas elementary school shooting, calling it “a cowardly attack.”