Geoff: It is good to be with
you.
We begin tonight with the
elementary school massacre in
uvalde, Texas, where 19 children
and 2 teachers were killed by an
18-year-old gunman Tuesday.
The devastated families continue
to demand answers, after
officials admit they did not act
quickly enough.
>> With a bit of hindsight, of
course it was not the right
decision, it was the wrong
decision, period.
There is no excuse for that.
I wasn't there, but from what we
know, we believe there should
have been an entry as soon as
you can.
When there is an active shooter
the rules change.
Geoff: On Friday, Texas
officials provided an updated
timeline of the shooting, which
revealed students and teachers
started calling 911 more than an
hour before law enforcement
breached the classroom to take
down the gunman.
Joining me now to talk about the
police response in uvalde is
Brian Higgins.
He's a professor of disaster
management at John Jay college
of criminal justice, and a
former swat team commander and
police chief in Bergen county,
New Jersey.
Thank you for joining us.
Brian: Thank you for having me.
Geoff: We learned yesterday that
before U.S. Border agents,
federal agents, entered the
classroom and killed the gunman,
a group of 19 law enforcement
officers stood in a hallway
outside the classroom and took
no action.
They effectively waited.
The commander on the scene --
uvalde school district police
chief -- decided it was no
longer an active shooter
situation, despite the gunman
being inside that room, kids
still being alive and calling
911, and sounds of sporadic
gunfire.
What is your reaction when you
hear that?
Brian: The definition of an
active shooter situation is when
someone is actively engaged in
shooting victims.
That's what we have here.
Even if it wasn't an active
shooter situation and we have
purely a hostage and barricaded
situation, there are still
tactics that are employed.
If you had a barricaded subject
who had hostages, and those
hostages are injured or in
immediate danger, that is when
you step up your timeline to
enter the target.
Geoff: There is reporting by NBC
news that those border patrol
agents who were initially told
by local police to wait and not
enter the school, that they
decided after about 30 minutes
to ignore that initial guidance
and find the shooter.
Again, more than an hour had
passed since the gunman had
arrived at the school.
How does that strike you?
That the federal agents
ultimately ignored word from
local law enforcement?
Brian: As we've seen in the last
several days, more information
comes out every time there is a
press briefing.
There are two elements in these
things that stick out.
One, they seem to correct
information from the previous
press briefing, and then they
add more information.
I think we need a very in-depth
investigation.
On the surface, what that is
telling me is the decision to
stand down was obviously wrong
and other officers on the scene
took it upon themselves to act
anyway.
You have not just officers of a
lower rank, but a completely
different agency who still
decided to do what they felt was
best for those victims.
Geoff: Based on what you know
about situations like this,
would local police have had the
training and tactical gear to
take down a gunman with two
assault rifles?
What accounts for the waiting,
do you think?
Brian: We will have to wait for
the investigation, but even if
they were outgunned and did not
have the best equipment at the
time, the fact of the matter is,
we expect our law enforcement to
be that -- all the terms we give
them, the thin blue line, the
last line of defense.
They are there to protect us,
and if need be, they need to put
themselves at risk to save
children.
Children at the ages of two to
fourth grade, I believe that is
your responsibility.
Geoff: A question about that.
It strikes me that prosecutors,
if it gets to that point, they
have to make a decision about
whether uvalde school district
police chief, Pete Arredondo's
decision and the officers'
inaction constituted a tragic
mistake or criminal negligence.
What does accountability look
like to you?
Brian: I think the investigation
will reveal a lot of that.
What we have to see is what did
that individual know?
If you knew there were victims
and their, if he heard gunshots
-- and again, this has not been
confirmed by law enforcement or
anybody in authority yet -- but
if that individual knew there
were victims severely injured,
if you did hear shots still
being fired, as law enforcement
officer, he either knew or
should have known that his
actions were directly contribute
in -- contributing to injuries
there.
Geoff: I want to ask you about
the quality of information we
are getting from Texas
officials.
They have changed their
statements about the shooting at
least 12 times.
At the Wednesday press
conference, the director of the
Texas department of public
safety said a brave resource
officer engaged with the gunman.
Three days later, that same
public information officer said
the resource officer wasn't even
on school grounds at the time.
There are still questions about
the police response.
To what do you attribute that?
Of course there is a fog of war
element that comes into play.
Give us a sense, from where you
sit, what accounts for the lack
of quality information coming
from Texas officials.
Brian: When we train incidents
like this, and they are all
crisis incidents, and in a
situation like this we are
talking about an active shooter,
is not just the training we
think about where we give
officers guns and a plan in they
practice.
There is a full-scale element to
this where an agency should
practice the initial 911 call,
several different iterations of
the scenario leading up to the
shooting, as the shooting
unfolds, and elements like this,
where we have a barricaded and
maybe a hostage situation.
Then there is after the
shooting, where we practice or
should practice public
information and how that is
done.
The current environment we are
in where social media plays in,
what happens is people put
information out and if you don't
do anything, there is a vacuum.
Officials really face a
difficult position of waiting
until they have enough
information, while combating
false information.
But I think a long, in-depth
investigation will see.
If you look at what officers
prepare for, any official, it's
almost an investigation.
What information do you have?
Have you vetted that information
and proven it is correct?
Geoff: Brian Higgins, thank you