“I went to mass with Joe and Irma every single Sunday and they made me a better person,” Garza said. “Peter needs to answer for his actions and show up and talk to us,” he said, referring to Peter Arradondo, the chief of the Uvalde Consolidated ISD Police Department who was the initial incident commander on Tuesday as the murders were taking place. The Daily Beast has made numerous attempts to contact Arradondo but have been unable to reach him. Neither has anyone else in this community who is seeking answers.

“I know they were scared but so were those babies,” said Suzie Morales, who used to work at Robb Elementary School and knew both of the adult victims very well. “Line up and go in there and shoot the bad guy.”…

Equally baffling to families is why Chief Arradondo wasn’t able to use some sort of master key to open the door of the classroom after discovering that it had been locked. McCraw told reporters on Friday that Border Patrol Agents had to secure a key from a janitor before being able to access the classrooms.

“I feel like they are setting this up to have law enforcement walk away like heroes and some of them are,” said Garza. “But the rest who didn’t do anything are nothing more than cowards. The parents were braver than that and they at least had an idea of what to do.”