Uvalde police response to school shooting was a failure, DOJ reports

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Uvalde police responding to the Robb Elementary School mass shooting in 2022 showed "no urgency" and their tactical blunders cost lives, according to a damning new Department of Justice report.

On 24 May, 2022, a gunman walked into Robb Elementary School and killed 21 people, including 19 students and two adults.

Police took more than an hour to confront the gunman despite being on-scene within three minutes of the first shots fired.

A DOJ report examining the shooting was released on Thursday, and found that a “cascade of failures” by the Uvalde police may have cost innocent lives. It further found that Uvalde police "demonstrated no urgency" in establishing a command post and failed in its duty to respond to the attack with speed and efficiency.

“The response to the May 24, 2022, mass casualty incident at Robb Elementary School was a failure," the DOJ wrote in the report.

The Uvalde police critically failed to recognize the gunman as an active shooter, and instead treated him like a barricaded suspect, according to the DOJ report.

“Officers on scene should have recognized the incident as an active shooter scenario and moved and pushed forward immediately and continuously toward the threat until the room was entered, and the threat was eliminated," the report says. “That did not occur.”