DALLAS — The attorney for Pete Arredondo says the former Uvalde school police chief did the best he could with the information he had at the time, which he believes means the embattled former cop should not be charged with a crime.
Arredondo and Officer Adrian Gonzales were indicted in June, the former chief on 10 counts of abandoning/endangering a child. Gonzales on 29 counts for what a grand jury decided was their lack of action at Robb Elementary two years ago when 19 students and two teachers were killed by a gunman.
"I've been scapegoated from the very beginning," Arredondo told CNN.
"To claim that you're a scapegoat, that you did no wrong, is absolutely appalling," responded Brett Cross, the father of Uziyah Garcia, who was one of the 19 students killed in the shooting.
In the CNN interview, with his attorney Paul Looney by his side, Arredondo refused to watch the bodycam videos again when asked to talk about his decisions that day.
"It's difficult for me to see that," Arredondo said. "These are my children too and people understand that."
"Saying that they are your kids, that is insulting me, that is insulting my child," Cross responded in an interview with our affiliate KENS5 in San Antonio. "That is the level of disrespect that I can't even begin to fathom that will come out of his mouth."
Friday afternoon in Houston, Arredondo's attorney laid out his defense, claiming that although two years have passed and a U.S. Department of Justice query found a police response filled with "a cascade of failures," he says the full details of what happened and when are not fully known yet.
"When a police officer makes their best possible decision based on the information they've got, it may or may not be right. But it's not criminal," Looney said. "And to charge this man under these circumstances is absolutely an outrage."
"You know, you can think all day and second guess yourself," Arredondo said in the CNN interview. "I know we did the best we could with what we had."
"It’s tragic to put the prosecution of two police officers ahead of a completely open, fact-finding investigation to improve protocols for next time," Looney said of the blame he believes should be placed on outdated rules and regulations. "These protocols didn’t work. They’ve got to be upgraded."
"I will spend the rest of my life making sure that he faces justice and accountability," Cross said after hearing Arredondo's CNN interview. "My son deserves that."
In May, family members of Uvalde school shooting victims reached a $2 million settlement with Uvalde. The city will pay a total of $2 million to the families of the children killed in the shooting and two children who survived, according to a statement from the families' attorneys.