Texas House Member and Terry County Representative Dustin Burrows plan to release the video of the Uvalde massacre. Burrows who is the chairman of the special committee investigating the May 24, Rob Elementary School shooting that killed 21 people, 19 of who were fourth-graders wants there to be transparency with the families and the public. Burrows said, “We feel strongly that members of the Uvalde community should have the opportunity to see the video and hear from us before they are made public.”
Almost a month after the deadly shooting, the Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw told a Texas State Senate committee in a June 21 hearing the response from law enforcement to the elementary school shooting was an “abject failure” and went on to claim the police could have stopped the shooter at Robb Elementary School three minutes after arriving if it had not been for the hesitancy and unwillingness of the on-scene commander, who “decided to place the lives of officers before the lives of children.”
According to the investigation, Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo had been waiting to receive the keys to the classroom door where the shooter was at. However, McGraw says that while the door was technically locked, its strike plate wasn’t properly functional, meaning officers could have entered without waiting for keys. Arredondo was eventually placed on leave and resigned soon after the incident and has been blamed for “placing the lives of officers before the lives of children.”
Surveillance footage already showed law enforcement officers were in the hallway outside the classroom for 77 minutes, before the shooter was killed. The same footage Burrows wants to release seemingly doesn’t show any violence or images of children since it was outside of a classroom and the footage also doesn’t have audio. Burrows had requested permission to release the footage from Texas DPS in a letter, however the Uvalde District Attorney objected to the request. Undettered by the district attorney, Burrows says he will release it after the Committee convenes in Uvalde on Sunday, July 17th. There, he will give an opportunity for the community to see the video first.
According to Burrows office, Saturday at 10:00 pm, the report and video will be released media, but it will be barred from release until noon on Sunday July 17, 2022. Sunday morning the committee’s report and video will be provided to the victim’s families. Then early afternoon, the committee will meet with family members and “walk them though” the report and answer their questions. This time period will be closed to the press. Late afternoon the committee will hold a press conference at the Uvalde Civic Center.
A Tweet sent out by Burrows on Tuesday, July 12, 2022 stated, “The Committee will convene at 2 PM on Sunday in Uvalde. We will meet with members of the community first, and provide them an opportunity to see the hallway video and discuss our preliminary report. Very soon thereafter, we will release both to the public.”
