77 Minutes - The Uvalde Massacre- The Untold Story - YouTube

I'll be honest, I've been struggling to finish this episode. My brother is a cop. I respect law enforcement. I know it's an underpaid, thankless job that most people wouldn't dare do and many people who criticize will never know what it feels like to have your life on the line. An armchair criticism is easy when you've never faced a life or death situation yourself. But what happened in Uvalde, Texas cannot be excused. It can't be brushed off as confusion or bad communication. Children were trapped inside a classroom. Shots still rang out. Blood was leaking under the door. And for 77 minutes, the police stood outside while some parents begged, some were handcuffed. And inside the school, children died. So how did so many trained police officers let this happen? And why did it take over an hour to act while shots were still being fired? And who, if anyone, has truly been held accountable? Let's try and find out. Hello, I'm Mike Joberg, Marine Corps veteran and filmmaker, and we will try to answer these questions on today's episode of Forgotten History. On May 24th, 2022, on the last week of school at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas, kids were winding down, looking forward to summer. The weather was hot. The mood was light. No one knew a monster was coming. His name was Salvador Ramos, 18 years old, isolated, angry. He had recently dropped out of high school and spent most of his time online, where he posted threats, violent fantasies, and selfies with firearms. People flagged his behavior on social media, but nothing was done. That morning, he argued with his grandmother. Then, he grabbed a rifle, one of two he had legally purchased just days after his 18th birthday, and shot her in the face. She survived, ran to a neighbor, and called 911. Ramos fled in her truck. At 1128 AM, he crashed into a ditch near Robb Elementary. Armed with an AR-15 and over 1600 rounds of ammunition, he climbed a fence and walked across the schoolyard, carrying the rifle in broad daylight. And here's the first critical failure. A school district police officer assigned to patrol the campus was nearby, but he didn't see Ramos. Reports later revealed he drove right past him. Others say he saw someone in the distance and mistook a teacher for the shooter. Either way, he never confronted him. Even worse, a back door to the school had been propped open. A teacher at Robb Elementary propped open the west entry door using a rock at approximately 1127 AM, just before Ramos arrived. The teacher had gone outside to retrieve her cell phone from her car and left the doorjar behind her. It was a common shortcut used during the school day. When she saw the crashed truck and Ramos approaching with a rifle, she ran back inside and kicked the rock away, letting the door close behind her. But the door did not lock, as it should have. It turns out the strike plate in the locking mechanism was faulty, meaning the door appeared closed, but was not secured. Ramos walked into the school at 1133 AM. No alarms, no locked doors, no resistance. The heavy latch clicks behind him, and from this moment on, every second he's inside, is borrowed time for the children in rooms 111 and 112. He turns left down the hallway, heading straight toward the fourth grade wing. He raises his rifle and fires a short burst, blowing out ceiling tiles and corridor lights. Shattered glass rains down, and teachers begin locking doors. In room 112, Ava Miralis yells, Lock down now, and slams her door. Red strobe lights flash, the fire alarm misfires, only a dull buzzing fills the hall. At 1134 AM, Ramos reaches room 111, fires into the window of the locked door, and reaches in to unlock it from the inside. He steps in and opens fire. The adjoining door into room 112 is left open during the scramble. That's his next target. Now he controls both rooms. Over the next minutes, he moves freely between rooms 111 and 112, shooting students and teachers. More than two dozen children and two teachers are trapped with him. Many are hit, some die instantly. Others will bleed out, waiting for help. At 1135 AM, the first Evaldi police cruiser screeches into the parking lot. Three city officers sprint inside through the west door, two carrying rifles, one a sidearm. They do not yet know where the shooter is, but his gunfire guides them. 1136 AM, two school district officers, including Chief Pete Arredondo and two more Evaldi PD officers, push in through a different entrance, on the south side. Seconds later, three additional city officers and another school officer follow the first trio through the west door. In all, seven officers are now in the hallway, without a clear tactical leader and no ballistic shields. 1137 AM, they edge towards room 111-112. Ramos fires a tight volley through the classroom door window. Sheetrock dust explodes, metal fragments tear into the shoulder of one officer. The group retreats around the corner. Bodycam footage captures a frantic exchange. We need shields. He's still active, the officers shout. 1138 AM, inside room 112, a ten-year-old girl clutches her teacher's cell phone, whispering to the dispatcher, please hurry, he shot my friend. The call stays open, muted sobs and intermittent pops bleed through the line. 1139 AM, the officers huddle behind a cinderblock wall. One keys his radio, subject contained to this office. But this isn't true, shots are still being fired, but the phrase becomes an excuse to pause. No one tries the door again. At 1140 AM, a mass text, Shooter at Rob ripples through town. Parents race to the school, many got there before the tactical team did. Some had received texts from their children trapped inside. They begged to be let in, they offered to go in themselves. Instead, they were held back. Some were tackled, others were pepper sprayed. One mother, Angelie Rose Gomez, was handcuffed by a US Marshal for interfering. After being released, she jumped a fence, ran inside, grabbed her two sons and got them out safely, while armed officers still held their position in the hallway. Dozens of armed officers hold back crying, screaming parents for over an hour while their kids bled out inside. And back inside, seven officers press themselves against cinderblock walls. No shields, no command post, no plan. At 1144 AM, a lone shot cracks from room 111. Drywall grit floats through the fluorescent lights. Officers flinch but hold. Active shooter doctrine says, move to the threat, yet no one moves. 1148 AM, school district officer Ruben Ruiz rushes in, radioing that his wife, teacher Ava Mirales, is bleeding inside. Fellow officers pull his gun and escort him out. The hallway shrinks back to paralysis. 1152 AM, a deputy drags a level 4 shield to the hall junction. One officer whispers, let's go. Another answers, we need keys. The shield stays parked, the door remains closed. 11 minutes later, at 1203 PM, a 10 year old girl in room 112 dials 911 again. There are 8 or 9 of us still alive. Dispatch relays the plea over police radios. Officers in the hallway hear it. Still, they do not advance. 1210 PM, more shields stack. Officers don gas masks and haul CS launchers, but no one authorizes their use. The hallway becomes a staging area, not an assault lane. 1215 PM, a dozen Border Patrol tactical agents, BORTAC, equivalent to police SWAT, some off-duty, enter with breaching tools and medic kits. They're ready to go. They offer to breach almost immediately, but were told to stand down by Police Chief Arredondo. 1221 PM, Muzzle flashes flicker under the classroom door. Four rounds. Dust wafts into the hallway. Officers debate keys, snipers, windows. Time bleeds away. 1235 PM, a Halligan breaching bar and a sledgehammer arrive, but Chief Arredondo insists the door is locked. Body cam footage records him rifling through key rings, testing none. 1247 PM, Arredondo finally gives the green light, but only if someone distracts the shooter through the window first. BORTAC ignores the suggestion and forms a four-man stack. 1250 PM, using a janitor's key, BORTAC opens room 111, a door that may never even have been locked, and they flood in. Ramos bursts from a supply closet firing. The four BORTAC officers return fire. 27 rounds in seconds. Ramos falls, children still alive, or carried past rows of officers who never step inside. 77 minutes passed from the first 911 call to the final shot. 400 officers entered the radio. Only four crossed the threshold. But why? Was it fear? Was it broken leadership? Was it a national climate, still raw from George Floyd's death two years earlier, with defund the police chants echoing, and a brand new White House ordering tight oversight that pushed officers into a cover-your-ass mood? Whatever the excuse, it doesn't really matter, because like me, you took an oath. And part of that oath was to protect the community, not just when it's easy, but when it's hard, when it's dangerous, and even when there's a chance you might not come home. In the hours after the breach, state officials gave a press conference, full of praise. They credited officers with running towards gunfire, called it a textbook response, and claimed the shooter had been engaged immediately. Well, none of that was true. Over the following days, the timeline fell apart. Footage leaked. Parents spoke out. The Texas Department of Public Safety began to change its story, again and again. Uvalde School Police Chief, Hernando, claimed he didn't consider himself the on-scene commander, even though his officers and gear were inside. He said the classroom door was locked. It wasn't. He said they were waiting for keys, but they had them. He said he was making decisions to preserve life, but the only people whose lives were preserved were outside the door. Texas Department of Public Safety Director, Steve McGraw, under mounting pressure, finally admitted the on-scene commander made terrible decisions. There's no excuse for that. In January of 2024, the U.S. Department of Justice released a 600-page report confirming what the public already suspected. There was a lack of leadership, training, and coordination, systemic breakdowns in communication, and a failure to prioritize innocent lives. According to the DOJ, every officer who stood in that hallway violated active shooter protocol, which has been standard since Columbine. The first priority is to stop the shooter, not to wait, not to contain, but stop. Chief Arradondo was fired three months after the massacre. Uvalde's entire school police force was suspended, and a handful of other officers resigned or were reassigned. But as of now, no criminal charges have been filed. Families of the victims have filed multiple lawsuits, including against the gun manufacturer and the Uvalde police. Robb Elementary has since been demolished. The survivors? Many are still in therapy, and some may never return to school. Despite the public outcry, key agencies are still hiding the truth. The city of Uvalde only released body cam footage, 911 calls, and internal emails two years later after losing a lawsuit to a group of journalists. And they did so against the wishes of District Attorney Christina Mitchell, who argued that releasing records could interfere with the prosecution of two school district officers, including the former chief. But attorneys for the news organizations say there's no evidence to support that claim, and under Texas law, those records are public. Meanwhile, the Texas Department of Public Safety, the school district police, and the Uvalde County Sheriff's Office are still fighting to keep their records sealed. So we're left with a partial picture. Over 19 children and two teachers were trapped inside for over an hour. At least some of them were still alive, well into the standoff. Some called 911, some bled out. The officers outside had rifles, shields, training, radios, but they didn't have the one thing, the will to act. So here's the question, what would you have done if your child was behind that door? And if the answer is, I would have gone in, then why didn't they? Before we end this story, we must acknowledge the victims. Because if we're going to talk about the failure, we need to remember who paid for it. These weren't just students and teachers. They were sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, people with dreams, birthdays, and futures that were stolen. So here they are. Thank you for watching Forgotten History. Please like, share, and subscribe. If you have any comments or show ideas, we'd love to hear from you. Thanks again.