Uvalde teaching aide says she begged officer Gonzales to intervene: 'He just stayed there'
A Robb Elementary School teaching aide testified that she repeatedly urged Uvalde, Texas, school police officer Adrian Gonzales to intervene in the shooting, but said he did "nothing" in those crucial moments.
Melodye Flores testified on Wednesday that she saw gunman Salvador Ramos before he entered the school and tried to tell Gonzales his location.
"I told him that he needed to get stopped before he went into the fourth-grade building," she testified.
"And what did he say?" prosecutor Bill Turner asked.
"He, just, nothing," Flores said.
"Did you say it more than once?" Turner asked.
"I did," Flores said, telling jurors she urged Gonzales to intervene two or three times.
Prosecutors allege Gonzales, who is charged with child endangerment, did not follow his training and endangered the 19 students who died and an additional 10 surviving students.
Gonzales, no longer an officer, has pleaded not guilty and his lawyers argue he is being unfairly blamed for a broader law-enforcement failure that day. It took 77 minutes before law enforcement mounted a counterassault to end the May 24, 2022, rampage.
Flores testified that she was eating lunch in her classroom when she learned about the shooter over a school radio. She said she ran outside because she knew that some students were on the playground and potentially in danger.
After warning some students, Flores said she spotted the gunman near the south door of the school.
"He was wearing all black and a hoodie ... that's when he started shooting," she said.
Flores said she started running away and tripped, and incorrectly thought she was shot.
She testified that she saw Gonzales drive up to her right after she tripped, and she tried to inform the officer about the shooter's location.
"I said that he was heading into the fourth-grade building, and we needed to stop him. We needed to go in and stop him before he went in," she said.
"I just kept pointing. 'He's going in there, he's going to the fourth-grade building,'" she told jurors.
"Did you hear anything from this gunman while you were talking to the police officer?" Turner asked.
"Just kept hearing shots," she said.
Flores said that Gonzales did not respond to her warnings.
"I kept telling him that he needed to be stopped," she said.
"When you told the officer to go in, did he go in?" Turner asked.
"No," she said.
"What did he do?" Turner asked.
"He just stayed there," she said.
Flores said she left Gonzales and tried to help a teacher who had sheltered in her classroom.
During cross-examination, the defense tried to cast doubt on the reliability of Flores’ testimony, suggesting that the trauma might have distorted her memories of the shooting.
Defense lawyer Nico LaHood highlighted that Flores testified that Gonzales arrived in an unmarked white car, though photos show he drove a marked school police car. Flores also previously told investigators that Gonzales wore khakis and a white shirt and had a beard; Gonzales was cleanly shaven that day and wore blue.
On Tuesday, during the testimony of Texas Ranger Ricardo Guajardo, prosecutors played a lengthy interview Gonzales gave to state investigators after the shooting.
In the interview, Gonzales recalled arriving at the school as one of the first officers and learning about the shooting from a coach.
"I was going over there towards her," he said. "I see her fall in the dust cloud. So I get to her, and I realized she's one of the coaches."
According to Gonzales, he learned the approximate location and a basic description of the shooter from the coach, though the shooting began before he could act.
Gonzales told investigators that he could not see the shooter, but he tried to notify others over his radio.
"I notify everybody on the radio, the best I could. And then, you know, as soon as I start walking over there, I see the rounds come out of the window," he said.
Gonzales also described trying to enter the school with four other officers, though they retreated after two were hit by gunfire.
"Everybody flew back, you know, so I think he got hit," he said. "We kind of moved back."
Two months before the shooting, Gonzales taught a course about responding to active shooters, according to testimony from Teresa Zamarripa, the officer manager at Southwest Texas College Law Enforcement Agency.
ABC News' Juan Renteria contributed to this report.
