Texas' Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw on Tuesday described the police response to last month's shooting at Robb Elementary School as "an abject failure" that unfolded at odds with "everything we have learned over the past two decades," The New York Times reports.
Speaking before a special state Senate committee, McCraw, head of the Texas State Police, said that authorities had enough equipment to storm the classroom in which the gunman was holed up mere minutes after he began shooting. But the on-scene commander — Pete Arredondo — "decided to put the lives of officers ahead of the lives of children," McCraw alleged, adding that Arredondo waited around "for a key that was never needed." Arredondo has said previously that he did not see himself as the one in charge, and that he and another officer felt it best to wait to confront the shooter after determining the doors to the classrooms were locked.
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