Police – NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Value

An exterior door at Robb Elementary College did not lock when it was closed by a instructor shortly earlier than a gunman used it to get inside and kill 19 students and two lecturers, leaving investigators looking out to find out why, state police said Tuesday.

State police initially stated a trainer had propped the door open shortly before the shooter entered the school in Uvalde, Texas, on Might 24.

They have now determined that the teacher, who has not been identified, propped the door open with a rock, but then removed the rock and closed the door when she realized there was a shooter on campus, said Travis Considine, chief communications officer for the Texas Division of Public Safety. However, Considine mentioned, the door didn't lock.

“We did confirm she closed the door. The door didn't lock. We all know that much and now investigators are wanting into why it didn't lock,” Considine stated.

Investigators confirmed the detail through additional video footage reviewed since final Friday’s information conference when authorities first stated that the door had been left propped open. Authorities didn't state at that time what had been used to prop open the door.

Considine said the trainer initially propped the door open however ran again inside to get her phone and name 911 when the gunman crashed his truck on campus.

“She got here back out whereas on her phone, she heard someone yell, ‘He has a gun!’, she noticed him bounce the fence and that he had a gun, so she ran again inside,” eradicating the rock when she did, Considine stated.

San Antonio attorney Don Flanary told the San Antonio Express-News that the Robb Elementary School worker, whom he’s not naming, closed the door shut after realizing that a gunman was on the free. She had initially propped it open to carry food from a automobile to a classroom, the lawyer stated.

“She kicked the rock away when she went again in. She remembers pulling the door closed while telling 911 that he was taking pictures,” Flanary informed the newspaper.

Funerals are deliberate for the subsequent two-and-a-half weeks for the 19 children and two academics who have been killed in that classroom on May 24.

“She thought the door would lock because that door is always purported to be locked,” Flanary said.

Flanary did not immediately return telephone messages left at his workplace from The Associated Press.

Investigators are also still making an attempt to interview Uvalde Consolidated Unbiased Faculty District Police Chief Pete Arredondo, who state police have mentioned was the commander of the college shooting scene while it happened.

Steven McCraw, the pinnacle of the Texas Division of Public Security, has stated Arredondo treated the lively scene as a hostage state of affairs and as if youngsters had been not in danger, whereas 19 law enforcement officials waited in the faculty hallway exterior the classroom the place the shooter was.

McCraw referred to as that the “fallacious resolution,” saying the focus of the investigation has shifted to Arredondo and the police response.

Other officers within the Uvalde metropolis and faculties police departments continue to take a seat for interviews and provide statements, but Arredondo has not responded to DPS requests for 2 days, Considine stated.