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According to experienced law enforcement experts, aggressive shooter response protocols require police officers to immediately attack and incapacitate gunmen. Especially if the target is a child.
However, police officers at the scene of Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, arrived within minutes of the May 24 attack and were posted in the hallway.
Images in the school show that police officers on the scene had long guns, bulletproof vests, and bulletproof vests. However, they were piled up in the hallway and did not break the classroom. There, a shooter who killed 19 children and 2 adults pierced.
Children in the elementary school classroom repeatedly asked 911 for help.
UVALDE classroom door unlocked during shooting while police officers wait for key: “serious failure”
However, officials said a tactical team broke the classroom door and shot him 77 minutes after the 18-year-old murderer entered school. Experts say it was too long.
“Attacking a shooter disrupts the shooter’s plans and requires the shooter to protect himself,” said Dave Katz, a former Special Agent for the U.S. Drug Enforcement and now CEO of the Global Security Group. Told Fox News Digital. “And if the archer is shooting you, it’s better than letting the archer attack the child.”
Based on images in the school, officers may have inadequate Level IIIA ballistic shields designed to protect only from common pistol ammunition, and inadequate training based on formation in the corridor. He said he saw it. Katz said his expertise included being a Master Shield instructor and leading the DEA’s Shield program in the 1990s.
“They were the wrong shields for the operation,” he said. “They had the wrong equipment and the wrong training.”
The stronger Level III shields would have protected the officers, he said, but even without them, they should have attacked the shooters.
“The moment those children are in danger, the shield goes down, goes down the hallway, and if they are shot, they shoot back,” said Katz, his three fathers. “When you get off, the next man will catch him.”
UVALDE SHOOTING: TEXAS DPS OFFICIALS BRING ROBB ELEMENTARY SCHOOL DOOR INTO STATE CAPITOL AHEAD OF HEARING
He said police needed to be trained to respond promptly and proactively, and warned that schools should always lock the front door.
Steve McLaugh, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, told a special committee in the State Senate last week to protect all Texans. .. “
He said the co-pilot on the scene had enough numbers and firearms to stop the shooter within three minutes.
According to the latest timeline released by law enforcement agencies, at least one DPS Special Agent appeared to be plagued by a lack of action being taken on the ground.
“If you have children there, you need to go there,” the DPS special agent repeated twice at 11:56 am.
“It was only the on-site commander who prevented the full-time officer’s corridor from entering rooms 111 and 112. The commander decided to prioritize the officer’s life over the children’s.” Said McLaugh at the hearing. “The officer had a weapon and the child had nothing. The officer had a bulletproof vest and the child had nothing. The officer had training and the subject had nothing.”
More than 10 police officers entered the school less than three minutes after the shooting, McCraw said, but the commander of the case, Pete Arredondo, the Uvalde school police chief, delayed their progress.
Aledondo ordered officers to wait for more tactical equipment and a key to unlock the classroom door, McLough said. Investigators later determined that the door was likely unlocked.
Mr. McLaugh said the inadequate training was “obvious and simple,” delaying Aledondo’s “terrible decision” and officers of other agencies wishing to move to the suspect. I blamed that.
Arredondo did not respond to FoxNews Digital’s request for comment.
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“No one was in charge of the point,” said former FBI Special Investigator Catherine Schweit, who launched the agency’s active shooter program.
She said the reaction was out of sync with the way police trained for the active shooter crisis.
“I believe in the first interview with the police chief. He said,’I wasn’t in charge,’ and now I’ve heard he was in charge,” she told Fox News Digital. “The bottom line is that no one was in charge.”
She said Schweit’s aggressive shooter response policy, triggered by the 2012 Sandy Hook shootings, included tracking the suspect directly and then incapacitating him.
“We do a more effective job from Colombine to get to where the shooters are, not only to stop shooting, but also to find opportunities to save people who may be injured or bleed. I learned what I had to do, “she said.
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It also means moving in regardless of whether the officers have ballistic shields and whether they are at the right level.
“Everyone wants the best and safest equipment. That’s great, but active shooter training doesn’t require a ballistic shield,” she said.
She said the training required a “period for the officer to track the shooter.” And if they had, uncertainty about door locks wouldn’t have been a problem.
“An important situation is another item that shows us that the officers did not perform the training they received,” she told FoxNews Digital. “If they were chasing the shooter, they would have gone through the door and noticed that it was unlocked.”
She also emphasized that schools need to focus on “running” with the slogan “run, hide, fight”. There is a reason why the word comes first.
“The first thing you should consider is running and running through the area,” she said. “We stand still with the teachers and children and hope that someone can come and save them, and they say they survived when the children fled school.”
She also questioned the wisdom of having a small school police station.
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“Will they help better to integrate departments to provide larger and more powerful training?” She asked. “Collaboration training is not the same as enabling every individual on the team to do what they need at Uvalde. They lack the resources, timing, training, and depth of these departments.”
At the very least, she said small departments should consider working closely with large neighbors or contracting with county agencies.
Congress and the Justice Ministry are considering Uvalde’s response.
Paul Best from Fox News contributed to this report.