Aug 24, 2022 - Politics & Policy

Uvalde school board fires its police chief

Shawna Chen

Photo of a person standing in front of a brick sign that says "Robb Elementary School" and is shrouded by flowers and signs — A memorial for the 19 children and two adults killed on May 24 during a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School is seen on May 30, 2022 in Uvalde, Texas. Photo: Yasin Ozturk/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

The Uvalde school board voted unanimously Wednesday to fire the school district's police chief for his handling of the May 24 mass shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School.

Why it matters: Pete Arredondo acted as the "incident commander" overseeing law enforcement's response to the school shooting, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. He has faced calls to be fired since it was revealed that 19 officers waited for nearly an hour in the hallways as the gunman barricaded himself in with victims.

Arredondo was placed on unpaid administrative leave and resigned from the Uvalde City Council shortly after the shooting.

Worth noting: Arredondo, who did not attend Wednesday's school board meeting, has countered that he never considered himself the incident commander and defended the police response in comments after the shooting.

Though the DPS placed the blame on local police's shoulders, an investigative report later released by a Texas House of Representatives committee found that the vast majority of the nearly 400 law enforcement officers who arrived on the scene were federal and state officers.

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Uvalde school board fires its police chief

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