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Uvalde college board fires Pete Arredondo for his much-criticised dealing with of the mass taking pictures that killed 19 kids and two academics.
A faculty board within the US state of Texas has fired a district police chief for his dealing with of the mass taking pictures that killed 19 kids and two academics within the metropolis of Uvalde three months in the past.
The Uvalde Consolidated Impartial College District Board (UCISD) of Trustees voted unanimously on Wednesday to fireplace Pete Arredondo. He had been on unpaid administrative depart since shortly after the Could 24 taking pictures.
Arredondo didn’t attend the assembly.
A written assertion from his lawyer, George Hyde, was emailed to board members simply earlier than the board met. It cited loss of life threats Arredondo has acquired and what it mentioned was the district’s lack of efforts to offer any safety for him.
He additionally wrote that the district was within the fallacious for dismissing Arredondo, saying it didn’t perform any investigation “establishing proof supporting a choice to terminate” him.
“Chief Arredondo is a frontrunner and a brave officer who with all the different regulation enforcement officers who responded to the scene, must be celebrated for the lives saved, as an alternative of vilified for these they couldn’t attain in time,” Hyde wrote.
Arredondo has come underneath scathing criticism for his dealing with of the bloodbath at Robb Elementary College in Uvalde, a small city in Texas Hill Nation, about 130km (80 miles) west of San Antonio.
Mother and father of youngsters slain and wounded within the deadliest US college taking pictures in practically a decade had demanded the varsity board dismiss Arredondo.
He was compelled to resign his seat on the Uvalde Metropolis Council on July 2. Three weeks later, the board was scheduled to determine Arredondo’s destiny as the varsity district police chief however postponed the assembly on account of “course of necessities” on the request of his lawyer.
In accordance with the Texas Division of Public Security (DPS), Arredondo acted as “incident commander” in control of regulation enforcement’s response to the taking pictures.
DPS officers mentioned 19 officers waited for an hour in a hallway outdoors adjoining school rooms the place the gunman was holed up together with his victims earlier than a US Border Patrol-led tactical crew lastly made entry and killed the suspect.
Arredondo, they mentioned, selected to not ship officers to confront the suspect sooner, believing the quick menace to college students had abated after an preliminary burst of gunfire within the school rooms.
Arredondo, who oversaw a six-member police power earlier than he was fired, has mentioned he by no means thought-about himself the incident commander and that he didn’t order police to carry again on storming the suspect’s place.
He’s the primary officer dismissed over the regulation enforcement response to the Could 24 tragedy.
Just one different officer — Uvalde Police Division Lieutenant Mariano Pargas, who was the town’s performing police chief on the day of the bloodbath — is thought to have been positioned on depart for his actions throughout the taking pictures.
The Texas Division of Public Security, which had greater than 90 state troopers on the scene, has additionally launched an inner investigation into the response by state police.
College officers have mentioned the campus at Robb Elementary will now not be used. As a substitute, campuses elsewhere in Uvalde will function momentary school rooms for elementary college college students, not all of whom are keen to return to high school in particular person following the taking pictures.
New measures to enhance college security in Uvalde embody “8-foot, non-scalable perimeter fencing” at elementary, center and highschool campuses, in response to the varsity district. Officers say they’ve additionally put in extra safety cameras, upgraded locks, enhanced coaching for district employees and improved communication.
Nevertheless, in response to the district’s personal progress experiences, as of Tuesday, no fencing had been erected at six of the eight campuses the place it was deliberate, and cameras had solely been put in at the highschool.
Some progress had been made on locks at three of eight campuses, and communication enchancment was marked as half full for every campus.
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