@LadyMarissa Here’s what I think, I think this official was telling the truth. He also said it was the wrong call, that it is obvious now it was the wrong call. He said he was there to answer questions, and that the facts of the situation will help them and every other police department to learn from what went wrong and hopefully do better if or when there is a next time. He cried at one point saying what matter is the children and their families and not how the police are doing right now, that their job is protect people and risk their lives when necessary.
I don’t know if the 911 operator didn’t communicate that there were children calling in saying they still needed help. Even if she did, the commander in charge might not have sorted it correctly in his head. It seems possible he assumed all the children barricaded in with the shooter were assumed to be dead already and that other children were calling in. It was chaotic I am sure. I am not excusing it, just saying even if the shooter was dead from suicide, so me children might still call in, because they might not know the up to the minute situation.
What I can’t excuse is I don’t care if he is assumed to be barricaded or if the shooting stops for a while, I think the police should assume he is alive and dangerous and go in to kill him period. Some sort of lull in the massacre doesn’t mean it is over. Even if he was barricaded, what is to stop him from getting a second wind and suddenly start shooting up the place again? It makes no sense. He needed to be stopped. The official giving the press conference said the protocol for an active shooter is to kill him, they do not need to try to take him in alive or anything like that, not from what I heard today.
The children were amazing in what they did handle. They were so young, calling 911 and they seemed to have an amazing grasp of what was happening. One girl had her friend shot and killed right next to her and then the shooter went into the next room. The girl put her hands in the pool of her friend’s blood and wiped the blood all over herself so she could play dead if the shooter came back. Makes me cry writing about it. Such a smart thing to do, and showed such courage and stamina while in the face of such danger.