AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — With the acquittal in the first Texas trial over the hesitant police response to the Robb Elementary School mass shooting, prosecutors must now decide how to try their case against the only other officer who was charged.
Officer Adrian Gonzales' trial was a rare prosecution of an officer accused of failing to save lives by preventing a crime. For nearly three weeks, Uvalde County’s district attorney laid out a case to jurors detailing how Gonzales did nothing to stop the gunman and bore responsibility for failing to protect the 19 fourth-graders killed in one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history.
But jurors found Gonzales not guilty after seven hours of deliberation, leaving Pete Arredondo, Uvalde’s former schools police chief, as the only officer still facing trial over the response to the May 24, 2022, attack, which also claimed the lives of two teachers.
Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell declined to comment on plans for proceeding against Arredondo, but experts indicate prosecutors are likely to modify their approach in light of Gonzales’ acquittal. The families of the victims continue to express outrage over the police response, particularly regarding why nearly 400 officers at the scene that day were not held accountable.
Gonzales and Arredondo were indicted on felony charges of child abandonment and endangerment, but the circumstances behind their individual cases differ significantly. Gonzales, accused of abandoning his training and duty to confront the gunman, argued he never saw the shooter before entering the building. In contrast, Arredondo is charged with failing to enforce the school district’s active shooter response plan during critical moments as officers waited more than an hour to engage the attacker.
Legal analysts expect that the upcoming trial for Arredondo will focus heavily on police training and decision-making in crises. Ongoing scrutiny of the police response has prompted calls for accountability, as many see the Gonzales case as a troubling precedent regarding officer conduct in traumatic incidents.
Victim's families, including Javier Cazares, the father of 9-year-old Jackie Cazares, voiced their dismay at the verdict, expressing a sense of continued failure in the justice system.
