Police officer husband of slain Uvalde teacher detained, disarmed after he tried to save his wife

AUSTIN (KWTX) - Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw on Tuesday told state lawmakers the police response to the massacre at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas on May 24 was an “abject failure.”

McCraw told the state senate that police at the scene had enough officers and firepower to have stopped the gunman three minutes after he entered the building, and they would have found the door to the classroom where he was holed up was unlocked if they had bothered to check it.

McCraw also revealed the husband of slain elementary teacher Eva Mireles, identified as Uvalde CISD Police Officer Ruben Ruiz, tried to save her but officers in the school prevented him from doing so.

McCraw said the teacher called her husband shortly after the gunman attacked her classroom and told him “she had been shot and was dying.”

“(Ruiz) tried to move forward into the hallway,” McCraw said. “He was detained and they took his gun away from him and escorted him off the scene.”

McCraw did not reveal which agency removed Ruiz from school grounds.

Copyright 2022 KWTX. All rights reserved.