New details have dispelled earlier accounts of a confrontation between the gunman and an armed school police officer outside the school, a story the authorities changed four times. First, officials said the gunman exchanged fire with the officer outside the school before going in. Later, McCraw said that there was an encounter, but no gunshots were exchanged between the two. On Thursday, officials said there had been no confrontation at all and that the gunman had simply walked in. On Friday, McCraw added that the school police officer was not on campus but rushed there after the 911 call about a man with a gun at the crash.

“He drove right by the suspect,” who was crouched behind a vehicle in the parking lot, and mistook a teacher for an intruder, McCraw said…

In Room 109, teacher Elsa Avila rushed to lock the door and turn off the lights. She told her students to hide under their desks, recalled a 9-year-old survivor, Daniel, whose mother asked that his last name not be used.

Daniel saw Ramos approach the window of his classroom door and shoot through the glass, striking Avila and another student a few feet away from him. Daniel said he and others were “playing dead” inside the classroom because they feared he could see them.

Bullets zinged around the classroom, with one fragment striking a fellow student’s nose. Daniel recalled a “crunching” sound as it struck bone.