CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Former Uvalde school district police officer Adrian Gonzales says he has no regrets about his actions during the 2022 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School, following his acquittal on all charges related to the incident. Gonzalez addressed the charges in aninterview with ABC News.
Gonzales, 52, was the first officer to respond to the scene where a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers. He was charged with 29 counts of child endangerment for his role in the delayed law enforcement response. After a two-week trial, a jury found him not guilty on all counts on Jan. 21, following roughly seven hours of deliberation.
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In his first public interview since the verdict, Gonzales told ABC News he believed he was unjustly targeted by prosecutors.
“You can sit here and tell me all you want about what I would have done, or what you would have done. Until you’re in that mix, you can’t tell me anything...” he said. “I don’t regret it, because I took an order from my chief at that time.”
Gonzales said he was one of the first officers to enter the school but retreated after receiving a direct order from a superior. He described the shooting as chaotic and emphasized that he acted based on the information available to him in the moment.
Though thankful for the verdict, Gonzales acknowledged the grief of victims’ families, many of whom attended the trial.
“Whatever I say to them, I know it’s not going to ease their pain... they’re always in my prayers,” he said.
Victims’ relatives expressed frustration with the outcome.
“We had a little hope, but it wasn’t enough,” said Jacinto Cazares, whose 9-year-old daughter, Jackie, was killed in the attack. “Again, we are failed.”
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Gonzales had spent 18 years as a teacher before joining the Uvalde Police Department and later the school district’s police force. He said the indictment and public scrutiny forced him to relocate with his family and ended his ability to work with children, something he described as a lifelong passion.
His attorneys argued that Gonzales was singled out because he was the first to arrive and among the lowest-ranking officers.
“They handpicked me,” Gonzales said. “They had an excuse for everybody else.”
Gonzales also expressed concern that individual blame may be distracting from broader failures in training and emergency preparedness.
“It’s going to happen again. You know, we don’t know when, we don’t know where, but it’s going to happen again,” he said. “Just want this tragedy to make another school better, another community better, so nobody has to go through this.”
Former Uvalde school police chief Pete Arredondo, also charged with child endangerment, has not yet gone to trial due to a pending civil lawsuit. Gonzales said he speaks with Arredondo daily and believes both will be vindicated.
“This is the first battle, and we’re going to win the second one,” he said.
Uvalde District Attorney Christina Mitchell declined to comment on the acquittal or the rationale for pursuing charges.
