The teacher who was at the center of the Uvalde mass shooting timeline issued statements disputing that she left a door “propped open” before the gunman entered.
The unnamed teacher’s lawyer, Don Flanary, told CNN that incorrect accusations that she left the door open have forced his client to come forward. Several days ago, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) said that an initial claim was not true and that the teacher instead closed the door but it did not automatically lock as it should.
“She felt alone, like she couldn’t even grieve,” Flanary told the channel. “She second-guessed herself, like ‘did I not do that?’” he added.
In an interview with ABC News, the lawyer said the claims were “traumatic for her when it’s insinuated that she’s involved.”
He said she went outside to bring in food before she saw a car crash, which officials later said involved shooter Salvador Ramos. The teacher then propped open the door with a rock to grab her phone to call 911 about the crash before she kicked the rock and closed the door, he said.
“[Someone] yelled, ‘He’s got a gun,” the unnamed teacher told NewsNation in an interview. “I ran back into my building. I still had the rock in the door. So, I opened the door, kicked the rock, and then locked [the door],” she added.
Texas DPS Director Steve McCraw last week made the claim that the teacher propped open the door before Ramos used it to enter Robb Elementary School. Later, an official walked back that statement in an interview with The Associated Press.
Travis Considine, a spokesman for the Texas DPS, said the door was supposed to automatically lock when it was shut, but it didn’t.
“We did verify she closed the door. The door did not lock. We know that much and now investigators are looking into why it did not lock,” he said.
Since the mass shooting, which left 19 children and two teachers dead, there have been conflicting accounts given to the public by state and local officials. Questions have emerged about the police response, and school police chief Pete Arredondo, who was the incident commander at the time, has given few interviews in recent days.
When confronted by a CNN reporter this week, Arredondo dismissed claims that he was not cooperating with Texas state officials.
“I am in contact with DPS everyday,” Arredondo said Wednesday. “We’re going to be respectful to the family,” he added. “We’re going to do that eventually. Whenever this is done and the families quit grieving, then we’ll do that obviously.”
