UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The principal of a Texas school where the deadliest classroom shooting in a decade has…
UVALDE, Texas (AP) — The principal of a Texas school at the site of the nation’s deadliest classroom shooting in a decade was reinstated Thursday, three days after she was suspended with pay over criticism of safety by lawmakers. by the committee.
Mandy Gutierrez, who was suspended with pay by Uvalde School District officials Monday as principal of Robb Elementary School, was reinstated Thursday in a brief letter from Superintendent Hal Harrell.
The reinstatement came after Gutierrez, in a letter to committee members, disputed key findings that the school had a “culture of complacency” that allowed a gunman to enter the school and kill 19 children and two teachers. She also said the lock on the door to the fourth-grade classroom, where the May 24 shooting occurred, had worked when a security guard checked it the night before.
Harrell suspended Gutierrez from his position with pay Monday pending a school safety performance review. However, in his letter Thursday, Harrell said she will be allowed to return to work immediately “and will continue to serve the county in an administrative capacity.”
The legislative report placed most of the blame on local, state and federal law enforcement, which took more than an hour to enter the classroom where the shooter was and kill him as parents outside the school begged officers to do something and dispatchers answered 911 calls from inside the school. CCTV footage of police in body armor milling about in a corridor as the gunman carried out the massacre has sparked outrage from the victims’ families, who have demanded he be brought to justice.
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