Bodycam footage was shown in court for the first time Thursday in the trial of Adrian Gonzales, the former Uvalde school police officer accused of child endangerment for what prosecutors call a lack of action in the 2022 mass shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers.
Daniel Coronado, a former police officer for the city of Uvalde, testified Thursday about entering Robb Elementary on May 24, 2022, along with Gonzales, then-police chief of Uvalde schools Pete Arredondo and former Uvalde police officer Donald Page.
The court showed Coronado’s bodycam footage as he entered the school, minutes after arriving on campus after he got word of an active shooter. The bodycam footage showed smoke and gunpowder filling the elementary school’s green and blue hallways, decorated with children’s art. The four officers can also be seen in the footage walking down the hall looking for the shooter.
Coronado said when another officer yelled out that he had been shot, Arredondo told Gonzales to leave the school to radio SWAT because their police radios weren’t working inside the school. Coronado then left with Gonzales, and the two covered the east side of the school in case the shooter escaped from a window.
Prosecutors argued that when Gonzales left the school to radio SWAT, he wasn’t taking action or confronting the shooter. The defense pushed back on that during cross-examination, getting Coronado to agree that Gonzales was following orders — which amounts to taking action, they argued.
The defense also discussed two other Uvalde police officers, Juan Saucedo and Jesus Mendoza, who arrived just seconds before Coronado. Coronado said that when he arrived on scene and got out of his car, he heard gunshots and saw Saucedo and Mendoza hiding behind their cars. Coronado said Saucedo then asked him for permission to shoot.
Coronado testified that he found the question odd because officers aren’t trained to ask for permission to shoot if there’s a viable threat. Coronado said he didn’t respond.
“Saucedo had the opportunity to shoot and he didn’t,” Nico LaHood, the defense attorney, said. Coronado agreed.
LaHood argued that both Saucedo and Mendoza had opportunities to intervene with the shooter, but didn’t. He also claimed that Gonzales couldn’t see the shooter, questioning why he was the one being charged with a crime.
“Doesn’t it seem unreasonable for someone to expect Adrian to know where the shooting is coming from, but you guys not know where the shooting is coming from?” LaHood asked Coronado during cross-examination. “Doesn’t that seem unreasonable?”
Coronado agreed that it seemed unreasonable.
Court ended early Thursday after Judge Sid Harle told the jury that there was an emergency with one of the jurors.
Gonzales has pleaded not guilty to 29 counts of child endangerment. His defense argues that he is the scapegoat for a larger failing among the nearly 400 police officers on scene that day.
