State of Texas: Former officers arrested 2 years after mass shooting at Robb Elementary

AUSTIN (Nexstar) — Two former Uvalde school district police officers, including the former chief, have been indicted on felony charges of child endangerment and abandonment for their roles in response to the second-worst mass shooting in American history.

It marks the first criminal charges in the highly-scrutinized police response to the May 2022 shooting, in which an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 children and two teachers.

Former Uvalde CISD police officer Adrian Gonzales was booked and released on 29 counts abandoning and endangering a child on Friday. Former Uvalde CISD police chief Pete Arredondo was been booked and released on 10 counts of child endangerment on Thursday. Both men turned themselves in to the Uvalde County jail and were released on $10,000 surety bonds, according to county records.

Nearly 376 law enforcement officers responded from a slew of local, state and federal agencies during and in the aftermath of the May 2022 shooting. It took officers approximately 77 minutes to breach the classroom and take down the gunman. The gunman was ultimately shot and killed by Border Patrol officers.

In January, Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell Busbee convened a grand jury to investigate why it took law enforcement more than an hour to respond to the active shooter, and whether subsequent criminal charges could be filed.

The grand jury suggested that Gonzales had an opportunity and the time to stop the shooter before he entered Robb Elementary. The allegations against Arredondo are focused on his response to the shooting.

"After hearing gunshots and after being advised of the general location of the shooter
and having time to respond to the shooter, they said Adrian Gonzales failed to engage.
distract or delay the shooter and failed to attempt to engage, distract, and delay the
shooter and failed to otherwise act in a way to impede the shooter until after the
shooter entered rooms 111 and 112 of Robb Elementary School and shot at a child or
children in Rooms 111 and 112," Gonzales' indictment reads.

The highly scrutinized police response prompted a scathing review from the Department of Justice earlier this year, in which the nation's highest law enforcement agency found there were "cascading failures" in officers' response to the massacre.

Initially after the massacre, a special Texas House investigative committee also reviewed the shooting, the school's safety and security protocols and police response. The three-member panel concluded there were "multiple systemic failures," ranging from a culture of noncompliance in regards to school security, as well as warning signs online from the shooter.

Rep. Joe Moody, D-El Paso, was vice-chair of the committee. In a statement to Nexstar, Moody said "accountability is important."

"I think anyone who read our report on the shooting knows that I believe Arredondo failed the families of Uvalde," he said. "But those same families are always my number one priority, so I hope the way this is handled provides them with justice and closure, not prolonged suffering."

Other responding officers who faced disciplinary action

Arredondo was the first law enforcement official to be fired over the “chaotic and uncoordinated” police response that day. Through his attorney, Arredondo has said he did not know he was the designated incident commander for the response, despite the UCISD active shooter policy “directing its police chief to assume command.”

Uvalde Police Department acting chief of police Lt. Mariano Pargas resigned from his position in November, days before the city was set to take a vote on his employment. 

Of the 91 Texas Department of Public Safety officers who responded to Robb Elementary on May 24, seven were put under investigation for their response to the shooting. Actions were taken against two officers, Ranger Ryan Kindell and Sgt. Juan Maldonado. Maldonado was terminated.

A third DPS employee, Trooper Crimson Elizondo, retired and then went to work as a police officer with Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District. Elizondo was fired from the district in October, after media reports revealed her new employment with UCISD, despite the fact that she had been under investigation by DPS for her response to the shooting.

After terminating Elizondo, UCISD suspended its entire police department and placed two top officials, Lt. Miguel Hernandez and Student Services Director Ken Mueller, on administrative leave. Mueller has since retired.

House Democrats call for federal electric grid corridors in Texas

Congressman Greg Casar led a congressional effort to establish more connections to the Texas grid. Casar, joined by 21 other members of congress, sent a letter urging the Biden administration's Department of Energy to build transmission lines between ERCOT and national electric grids.

"Even if we just build up electric transmission around the state, it'll make it easier for us to hook into that. And we'll be able to use that in times of extreme need." Casar told our Will Dupree in an interview.

Along with this letter to the Biden administration, Congressman Casar co-sponsored the "Connect the Grid Act". It would require ERCOT to connect to the nation's two major power grids.

Some republicans, including Randy Weber of Texas, opposed the bill, saying that the national grid had its own challenges. At this point the bill has only been referred to the Subcommittee on Energy, Climate and Grid Security.

US Surgeon General: Gun violence is an epidemic

US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy says gun violence in America is now a public health crisis.

Murthy warns the epidemic not only impacts victims of gun violence but also the mental health of our country as a whole.

This type of advisory can help shift the course of public health history, most notably when it raised awareness about the dangers of smoking tobacco and Dr. Murthy says he wants to do that now.

"Gun violence is a public health issue,” said Murthy. He added, "gun violence has now become the leading cause of death among kids and teens and that was not true a decade ago, two decades ago."

Murthy says the advisory not only focuses on the deaths and injuries involving firearms but also the ripple effects.

"Those reverberating traumas have taken a toll on the mental health of our country,” he said.

Murthy says public health advisories can make a difference, pointing to the 1964 surgeon general report about the dangers of smoking tobacco.

"That ultimately dramatically dropped smoking rates from 42% in 1964 to under 12% today,” he said.

Murthy's advisory on gun violence proposes a ban on automatic rifles, universal background checks and penalties for people who don't safely store their firearms.

The National Rifle Association quickly condemned the advisory saying, "this is an extension of the Biden administration's war on law-abiding gun owners. America has a crime problem caused by criminals."

"We need Congress to keep pushing for and passing new legislation, said Rob Wilcox of the White House Office of Gun Violence.

Wilcox says the advisory should push lawmakers to put partisan politics aside.

"So that we can keep saving lives in this country,” Wilcox added.

Murthy says in the absence of action at the federal level, state lawmakers, even community organizations and schools could adopt some of his recommendations

A new White House report found the law's enhanced background checks has stopped about 800 sales of guns to people under 21 years old and more than 500 people, including some linked to cartels and crime rings, have been charged with gun trafficking and other crimes.

Settlement reached in lawsuit claiming doctors left residents alone for heart surgeries

The U.S. Attorney's Office said in a release three Houston heart surgeons left "unqualified" residents in operating rooms alone for complex surgeries in order to perform other surgeries at the same time.

According to allegations in a federal whistleblower lawsuit unsealed on Monday, the three doctors simultaneously managed two operating rooms, often leaving critical portions of surgeries to inexperienced residents and fellows. Procedures in question included complex operations such as coronary artery bypass grafts and valve repairs.

The lawsuit states the surgeons did this from 2013 to 2020 at Baylor St. Luke's Medical Center, and helped the doctors earn higher compensation while putting patients at risk. It says the practice created $150 million in profits for their institution in the process.

Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center, Baylor College of Medicine, and Surgical Associates of Texas P.A. have agreed to pay $15 million to settle allegations that they improperly billed Medicare for concurrent heart surgeries, U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani announced Tuesday.

The private whistleblower will receive $3,075,000 of the settlement under the False Claims Act, the release said.

"Patients entrusted these surgeons with their lives — submitting to operations where one missed cut is the difference between life and death," said Hamdani. "This settlement reaffirms the importance of Medicare requirements governing surgeon presence."

In a statement, Baylor College of Medicine General Counsel Robert Corrigan Jr. said the school did not violate federal law or regulations and that “no patients were harmed.”

“The College decided to amicably resolve the dispute prior to a trial on the merits after considering the cost and expense incurred by Baylor to date, and anticipated future costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees,” Corrigan Jr. said.

The $15 million settlement, the largest of its kind involving concurrent surgeries to date, includes a $3.075 million payment to the whistleblower under the False Claims Act. None of the defendants were found guilty, and charges were dismissed as a part of the settlement.

One of the doctors named in the lawsuit provided Nexstar with a comment following the announced settlement.

“We have proven using hospital records and operating timelines that I was in the operating rooms and did the operations I claimed and therefore have done nothing wrong,” Dr. David Ott said Tuesday.

KXAN attempted to contact all of the doctors connected with the lawsuit. This story will be updated when responses are received.

The investigation, which began in 2019, said surgeons would sometimes enter a second or third operation without designating a backup surgeon, and would falsify records to suggest they were present throughout the duration of each surgery.

"Any time any one of us goes under the knife as a vulnerable patient, we implicitly trust that the surgeons and medical professionals have our best interest at heart," said Douglas Williams, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Houston field office. "In this case, doctors gambled with their patients’ care."

The U.S. Attorney's Office, alongside the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General and FBI, conducted the investigation.