Texas DPS says Uvalde school shooter was not one of students arrested for 2018 threat
The Texas Department of Public Safety shut down claims that the 18-year-old gunman who killed 19 students and two teachers Tuesday at a Southwest Texas elementary school was previously arrested for threats against a Uvalde school.
Early Friday morning, U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, said he had asked authorities to look into a claim that school shooter Salvador Ramos was arrested in 2018 for threatening to shoot up a school, according to the Daily Beast.
“This wasn’t hearsay. I got this late last night: ‘The shooter was arrested years ago, four years ago, for having this plan for basically saying, for saying, you know, when I’m a senior in 2022, I am going to shoot up a school,’” the Daily Beast reported that Gonzales told Fox News. “Something fell between the cracks between then and now to allow this to happen. We need to shake out all the facts.”
In a news conference later Friday, DPS Director Steven C. McCraw shut down the allegations, saying that although the 2018 incident did occur, the threats were made by different students.
“He was not one of the individuals, in fact, we have found no links or associated relationships in that investigation,” McCraw said, adding that two juveniles, who were 13 and 14 years old at the time of the incident, were charged with conspiracy to commit capital murder.
“There’s no question that we thought — we had evidence, and certainly the district attorney agreed — that these juveniles … were a threat to Uvalde and there was a discussion at that time that the senior year – of the one that was 14-years-old – would make it 2022. However, it was not [Ramos].”
