Uvalde After Action Report

[cjwils]

Shields?

Looking at a video of the cops in the hallway, I see that some of them had ballistic shields. I know nothing about those. I assume there is a range of strength and thickness, and a range of what bullets can be resisted. Can anyone tell by looking if those shields could have resisted bullets from an AR15? That would have given the cops much greater protection if they had advanced.

 

[fastbolt]

We're talking about protecting the most valuable resource to guarantee the future of our society ... meaning our children.

Yes, entering into a contained structure environment to look for an armed/active shooter is dangerous. Very. No surprise there.

So, it was approx 1hr20min from the time the suspect made his entry to the school building, to the time the police 'neutralized' him?

Administrative/tactical review aside, that's too long. People can die every few seconds during an active shooter incident. Especially with a lot of potential victims unable to escape the area.

I've spoken and listened to a number of retired and still-active cops about this debacle. Lots of years of experience and assorted training among them. Nobody with whom I've spoken has admired the actions exhibited on-scene in Uvalde. Even a cop who is currently familiar and tasked with training an agency for these sort of situations isn't buying excuses for anything less than an immediate aggressive entry, no matter the lack of additional personnel or the level of safety equipment and weapons available.

Yes, cops responding to such scenes are going to be putting themselves at great risk of seriously bodily injury or death. Comes with the job. Don't like it? Well, you can always work harder to promote upward and ride (behind) a desk back at headquarters.

If it was easy or safe, anybody could do it.

Yes, ARR's are MMQB exercises. Considering the decades and opportunities during which we've been able to acquire experience regarding what can go right/wrong when threats enter our schools, why haven't we already war-gamed such things?

Just my thoughts.

 

[44 AMP]

Anybody else here remember when officer safety was NOT job #1 in the police depts??


I'm not expecting or demanding the cops do stupidly suicidal things, only that they not stand around, doing nothing useful, while people are being killed.

The system, and rigid adherence to it is what failed in this case. As I see it,,anyway...

 

[Limnophile]

You are, by circumstance and law, your own first responder:

https://youtu.be/yyDcjUuYUgs

 

[Limnophile]

Anybody else here remember when officer safety was NOT job #1 in the police depts??

I think the LE mission shifted to cop safety über alles with the 1980's show, Hill Street Blues. After each opening roll call the presiding sergeant would conclude with, "Let's be careful out there." Society morphed this into officer safety above else, despite the fact that law enforcement is not even one of the ten most hazardous jobs in the country:

https://advisorsmith.com/data/most-dangerous-jobs/

Being a cop is the 25th most dangerous job category. Being a logger is #1, nearly six-times more dangerous than being a cop. If you want to honor a patriot, thank a logger, a pilot, a roofer, a construction worker, a crossing guard, a garbage collector, a farm supervisor, a delivery driver, an iron worker, or a farmer. Yes, the people who grow or raise your food die on the job at more than twice the rate cops do. And, they are not covered by a SCOTUS ruling saying they have no duty to protect (i.e., no duty to do the job they were hired to do; see above), nor do they have virtual unqualified immunity that preserves their job when they either err or flagrantly violate the law.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Being a cop is the 25th most dangerous job category.

And there is a very decent chance that if a cop is injured or killed in the line of duty, it is a non-pursuit traffic accident rather than some sort of battle.

With that said, I think Uvalde could have been summed up with this Washington Post headline...
"Police slow to engage with gunman because 'they could've been shot,' official says" that quoted a TxDPS Lt. spokeman.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/05/27/uvalde-shooting-police-gunman-shot-olivarez/

You are, by circumstance and law, your own first responder:

Thank God we had highly trained small children in that school, right?

 

[shafter]

Something very strange is going on when these same poorly trained cops consistently run into danger for domestics, mental health, and other gun calls, and take charge and solve the problem, yet, whenever its a school they show up in dozens or even hundreds but no one does anything even though the doctrine on how to resolve school shootings is crystal clear these days.

I don't really have a point here, but I find it extremely odd that this happens. It's one of those things that makes you stop and think.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

shafter, you are making an interesting point, even if you don't know it. I think we will see more and more of this. Things were supposed to have changed since Columbine and a LOT of officers have been VERY proactive in seeking and stopping/destroying active shooters. Then we have the 'fraidy cops. I don't have a nicer way to say that.

In the case of Uvalde and King Soopers in Colorado, you had cops make entry fairly quickly, got their noses bloodied (at King Soopers, one was killed) and apparently that was the one and only trick they knew and after that, it was surround and contain the premises, wait for backup, and to hell with anyone inside. It was like they tried one thing and then were just all out of ideas of what to do to help anybody inside.

At Parkland, there was a highly trained and decorated SRO on premises at the time the shooting started. He responded across campus, but made zero attempt to engage and remained outside of the involved building. He, like the officers at Uvalde, actively worked to keep other officers from attempting to make entry or otherwise engage the shooter.

For crying out loud, if you won't do your job, then please don't stop other people from doing theirs.

 

[JohnKSa]

I think that one thing to keep in mind is that we can't make excuses for the cops just because we feel that it's understandable for people to be scared in that situation.

The key thing to remember is that they signed up to do that job.

No one made them be cops--they chose to do the job knowing that it would entail danger.

No one was standing over them making them continue to be cops. At any time, if they stopped being willing to deal with the inherent risks they can pick another job.

There are jobs out there I would never take. Jobs I would not do, even for a lot of money. But the fact that I refuse to do them doesn't give the people who DO choose to do those jobs, the right to do them badly or incorrectly.

If you CHOOSE to do a particular job, then it's up to you to do it right, and you should bear the responsibility if you do it wrong or fail to do it when required. NOT because it's easy. NOT because I would be willing to do it, but because you CHOSE to do it, you have been trained to do it and because people are relying on you to do it.

 

[44 AMP]

Society morphed this into officer safety above else, despite the fact that law enforcement is not even one of the ten most hazardous jobs in the country

I think it might be more accurate to say that it was police culture, not general society's attitudes that changed the most.

Cops rarely get in personal trouble if they follow established procedures, even when doing that fails to save lives. The cops don't get the blame their procedures and training do.

IF that even happens...

So, this is where I have a problem, yes its a dangerous job, but none of the cops are draftees. Everyone one is a volunteer, who not only sought out the job, but managed to complete the training required, and so knows full well the risks the job entails. AND, they get PAID to do it.

I believe that creates a certain moral and ethical responsibility. I also believe that lockstep adherence to established protocol, (including doing nothing without specific direction) when it is obvious that is putting innocent people at risk is a breach of that responsibility.

 

[shafter]

Dougle Naught - What's troubling to me is that in every other situation these cops were probably brave. They've probably all responded to scenes where the suspect was at least as dangerous if not more. What doesn't make sense is that suddenly they back down when it's a school.

JohnK - The problem I'm seeing is that we have expectations for law enforcement that far exceeds the level of training they are given. Imagine getting hired to pour a foundation and yet given no training on how to do it right. Then, when you screw it up everyone gets mad at you and says "well, he signed up for it."

Departments need to be held accountable for lack of training. I'm sure that nowadays many departments are doing some sort of active shooter training but when you take a close look at the actual training evolutions they're pure garbage. I've seen this first hand with agencies I work with.

Cops understand that the odds of ever having to respond to an active shooter call are extremely low and in the meantime focus on settling important problems every community faces every day like domestics, mental health calls, and drunk drivers. If we crush cops for failing in these situations there won't be many left to handle the other problems. They'll all leave. The solution is training. Good top tier training from reputable sources.

 

[44 AMP]

The solution is training.

The solution is training.

You're not wrong, but it is rarely quite that simple.

I've been "trained" for years in accident investigation, root cause analysis and (industrial) emergency response, and as long as there is any human involvement in the situation, " The solution is training." Often, but not always there are other factors involved, but whenever there is a human, then "training" is ALWAYS one of the factors.

And this catch-all category applies if the person does what they're trained to do , AND if they don't.

"Training" is always the scapegoat when things go wrong, and almost never given more than a passing mention when things go right. When things go wrong, despite the training being followed then training gets the blame for being inadequate, incorrect, or insufficient.

When things go wrong because the person/people involved IGNORE their training, (either willfully or unintentionally) training STILL GETS THE BLAME...

"Training" is a huge blanket, and is stretched to cover virtually everything, sometimes stretched so thin as to be essentially transparent.

So, while "the training needs to be improved" IS actually the solution, what generally happens is we get sidetracked in the merry-go-round of specifics, what, and where changes need to be made, and often every kingdom builder in the bureaucracy sticks their own thumb (priorities) into the mix, and the resultant stew become the next, new standard, until THAT fails and the whole blame game starts over...

If you think that meddlesome, agenda driven people don't screw up what the training is/should be, I suggest you review what happened when someone suggested airline pilots be allowed to be armed...

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Dougle Naught - What's troubling to me is that in every other situation these cops were probably brave. They've probably all responded to scenes where the suspect was at least as dangerous if not more. What doesn't make sense is that suddenly they back down when it's a school.

So, what you are saying is that these cops were fair weather cops, good for routine activities, but just not prepared for a real crisis? What I find most troubling isn't that they were possibly brave in other situations and failed to do so here, but that this is when the stakes were the highest and they had people on scene from nearly the very beginning that were trained SPECIFICALLY for this type of event. An SRO arrived on campus within moments of the shooter and actually (unknowingly) passed the shooter while still outside of the school. Other officers arrived before the shooter even entered the school. Moreover, after the shooter entered the school, other officers showed up that were trained SPECIFICALLY for this type of event. You talk about training being the answer and these people had training. The Uvalde CISD Police Chief, Arredondo was on the scene VERY early on and is among the first officers to make entry into the school.

JohnK - The problem I'm seeing is that we have expectations for law enforcement that far exceeds the level of training they are given. Imagine getting hired to pour a foundation and yet given no training on how to do it right. Then, when you screw it up everyone gets mad at you and says "well, he signed up for it."

This was NOTHING like getting hired to pour a foundation and not given any training to do so. EVERY LEO gets a goodly amount of training and there were most definitely people on scene with the specific training needed exactly for this kind of event. Never mind that broad level officer training also covers this sort of event. However, going back to your foundation example, all of these guys had training to pour foundations.

As noted, the first LEO on scene was a SRO who was trained for this task. The Uvalde SWAT team was trained for this very task. The Uvalde CISD Police Arredondo that arrived on scene (and later claimed to not be in control despite issuing orders and the school specifically being his jurisdiction, recognized as the incident commander, etc.) had his latest school shooter training just a few months before. He was trained for this very type of event. https://www.insider.com/uvalde-police-chief-took-active-shooter-courses-in-december-report-2022-5

Yes, they very much did sign up for this, particularly the Uvalde ISD Police officers. They trained for this. This was not something outside of the realm of expected jobs that they might have to perform. https://www.ucisd.net/Page/2120 Let's face it. This isn't 1955. School shootings aren't virtually unknown. Why do you think Uvalde CISD had their own police force in the first place?

Cops understand that the odds of ever having to respond to an active shooter call are extremely low and in the meantime focus on settling important problems every community faces every day like domestics, mental health calls, and drunk drivers. If we crush cops for failing in these situations there won't be many left to handle the other problems.

That is like saying firemen mostly deal with little fires, vehicle accidents, etc., so you are okay if they decide not to fight a fire because it is bigger than what they do on a daily basis. I can see it now, the firemen sayng, "That is a big school fire. We might get hurt fighting it. We will just stand around outside and make sure nobody else does anything to put out the fire or save the people inside."

Yeah, if we crush the cops who aren't doing their jobs, they should leave because we can't count on them when we really need them, like when our children and their teachers are being shot, some killed, and some just left to bleed out for 90 minutes until some other federal law enforcement folks whose job has nothing to do with the situation finally take some action.

Arredondo got crushed. Other than you and Arredondo, I don't think anybody is upset about him getting crushed. Others should be as well.

And it isn't like they didn't know that there were wounded children and teachers inside the classrooms. When SRO Ruiz reported that his wife is shot and down in her classroom after he spoke with her on the phone, he got escorted from the building, detained, and disarmed. https://www.kwtx.com/2022/06/21/pol...tained-disarmed-after-he-tried-save-his-wife/ After all, we can't have some crazy cop trained for this sort of thing trying to save people, right?

However, you say more training is needed. Okay, there were nearly 400 law enforcement officers on scene by the time the gunman was taken out by the Border Patrol Tactical Team. You think they were trained specifically for dealing with school shooters?

There was Uvalde CISD Police, Uvalde Police, Uvalde SWAT, Uvalde Sheriff's Office, TxDPS, Border Patrol, Border Patrol Tactical Team, US Marshalls, DEA, and a smattering of officers from surrounding towns and counties. How much more training do you want? There were more law enforcement officers present at Uvalde, nearly double than who defended the Alamo against Santa Anna's army of ~4000 soldiers, LOL, but the lone gunman was the only one in control of the situation. That gunman, unlike the HUNDREDS of officers, did not have any training.

I would assume that in short order, all of Uvalde CISD Police officers were on scene. Did they have any training? Sure. As noted, Arredondo had just got through his training again a few months prior for active shooters.

Officer Celia Flores - Flores serves on the board as Region 5 Director for the Texas Association of School Resources Officers. She is currently working to obtain her intermediate certification and has attended numerous safety trainings such as Crisis Intervention, Advanced Hostage Rescue, and Youth Mental Health Awareness.
https://www.ucisd.net/domain/1725

No doubt the other SROs did as well, hence why they were SROs, right? Sadly, their creds do not appear to be currently listed on Uvalde CISD's website anymore.

And what about Uvalde PD SWAT? Usually, SWAT teams are the best of the best, high speed, low drag, highest trained, most gear and most powerful gear. Dang, these folks certainly look like they can handle themselves.https://www.facebook.com/uvaldepd/photos/a.984027511630606/2986614501371887/?type=3

That was, of course, their photo of when they posted on FB about how they would be in full tactical gear and touring Uvalde schools and businesses in 2020...you know, so that they could learn the layout of the premises in case there was an incident, you know, like a school shooting...

The issue wasn't that there weren't officers there with training for the job.

 

[Limnophile]

Uvalde law enforcement officers terminated:

https://youtu.be/CtOoTd4enw8

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Uvalde law enforcement officers terminated:

https://youtu.be/CtOoTd4enw8

NO. Only one current officer was fired, only the newest officer who was hired from DPS and who was determined to have performed poorly when responding to the shooting as a DPS officer and because of comments she made at the time. The rest are on suspension from the PD, but still employed by the district.

 

[HiBC]

I'll say it again. The pic above of the Uvalde SWAT Team LOOKS impressive.
They spent the money.
They probably have at least a step van to transport in. Likely 1000 yd rifles,rangefinders ,spotting scopes.

And we can assume they did range days and drills. Maybe went to training schools.

Training is good but its only effective when it is combined with decisions and action. Whether it is a picture perfect SWAT Team or an Army of One.

Once again, 2007,New Life Church, Colorado Springs, a heavily armed nut case went into a church to rack up a body count.
An armed ex cop was in the congregation as authorized security. When the killer entered the building shooting,casualties in the parking lot, this petite Woman with her sidearm headed into the gunfire and dropped the killer with the AR-15. I'm leaving her name out because she does not want attention.

These killers are not typically Delta Force. They are coward punks shooting unarmed kids. Confronted by one "Good Guy" who shoots back, its not unusual for them to choose a quick suicide.

Parkland? Klebold and Harris? Sandy Hook? This punk at Uvalde? Had they been to Thunder Ranch or Gunsite? Ranger School? No. They were punk wannabes who might have watched video games and posted selfies.

And I think any one,or better two beat cops with the arms in most patrol cars and the training most cops get would be fully capable of heading toward the gunfire and stopping the murder of children.
Dangerous? YES!! Could they get killed? YES!! But beat cops face that every day. DV calls,traffic stops. Getting ambushed gassing up.

At least in an active shooter scenario, the element of surprise is mitigated.
The Officer (S) can go in 100% on their toes. Even if they get hit, unless its a CNS hit,with body armor there is a good chance the bad guy can get hole punched.
SWAT is good. But one or two determined beat cops can stop the killing.So can an armed Custodian or Teacher. The time thing. That might save 5 or 10 kids. Thats what we are talking about. Its often one wimpy coward punk who just bought an AR or AK or shotgun for his fantasy.

One more thought. Looking at the pic of the Uvalde SWAT Team... I have no doubt they are well trained,well equipt volunteers who were there because they wanted to be.

As some famous military leader pointed out,

"There are no poor units. Only poor leaders"

A failure the scope of Uvalde is almost certainly a failure of command.

Officers who were willing and able to intervene were forced to stand down.

 

[thallub]

Texas has fired three state troopers over the Uvalde train wreck:

"The fired trooper was identified as Sgt. Juan Maldonado, CBS News learned Friday. Maldonado is the third officer to be fired over the botched law enforcement response to the shooting."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-state-trooper-fired-response-uvalde-shooting-juan-maldonado/

 

[Gas Bag]

I don’t want to be a dog chewing on a bone, but when I saw the photo of the Uvalde SWAT team, I thought that they are all flash and no bang.

 

[fastbolt]

Training is the answer when training is a problem.

The right people are the answer when people are the problem.

You can't field the right people if you don't look to attract and hire them. Despite what recruiting posters and recruiting officers at booths at job fairs like to promote, LE is not something that everybody has the psychological stability and willingness to effectively do. Yes, there's also a physical component to the requirements of the job when things don't go smoothly.

You can't promote and appoint the right people if you don't have them among the candidates from which to choose. This includes the leadership at the top. Having a wall full of certificates and diplomas is great for interior decorating and photo ops, but it really only means someone filled out their name on a training roster and had a seat at some training event. Just because they were good test-takers doesn't meaning they could walk the walk outside the safety of a training class and environment, let alone took the critical elements of their training experience to heart and back to work with them.

Going to a swat or active shooter training isn't like being a graduate of Top Gun. You can listen to Danger Zone on your device while running and exercising, but that just means you're listening to music.

 

[shafter]

I think part of the problem is that nowadays the majority of day to day activities of law enforcement is on the opposite end of the spectrum of the small percent when all hell is breaking loose. Being well suited for most of the job means that most cops aren't necessarily suited for that call of a lifetime. The people who you want when things are really going sideways aren't the ones you want handling the day to day calls and vice versa. Training helps but only so much.