Crime & Safety

Salvador Ramos Warned On Facebook About Texas School Shooting: Abbott

After shooting his grandmother, the gunman threatened to "shoot an elementary school" just before the attack, according to Gov. Greg Abbott.

Police walk near Robb Elementary School following a shooting, Tuesday in Uvalde, Texas.
Police walk near Robb Elementary School following a shooting, Tuesday in Uvalde, Texas. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills)

UVALDE, TX β€” There was "no meaningful forewarning" of a shooting Tuesday at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, except for a series of messages on the gunman's Facebook page around 30 minutes before the attack, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Wednesday.

The shooter, identified by Abbott as 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, killed 19 students and two teachers and wounded 17 others, according to state authorities.

Ramos wrote Tuesday, "I'm going to shoot my grandmother," Abbott said at a news conference. He then wrote a follow-up that read, "I shot my grandmother."

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Around 15 minutes before the attack at Robb Elementary School, Abbott said the gunman wrote his last message: "I'm going to shoot an elementary school."

The governor described the shooter's messages as posts, but Meta, the parent company of Facebook, says they were one-on-one private messages.

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Facebook is working with investigators, according to Meta spokesperson Andy Stone.


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Authorities have found no criminal history or history of mental illness for Ramos "yet," Abbott said, but are still determining if he had a juvenile record.

Ramos, who is from Uvalde, was "reportedly a high school dropout," the governor said.

After shooting his grandmother in the face, Ramos drove to the school and crashed his vehicle nearby, Abbott said.

After injuring school resource officers outside the building, the shooter entered the school through a back door and barricaded himself in a pair of adjoined classrooms with an AR-15 style rifle, according to the governor.

All the students and teachers killed in the shooting were in those classrooms.

"It is intolerable and unacceptable for us to have in the state anyone who would kill little kids in our schools," Abbott said.


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