Elementary Shooting In Texas: Perpetrators Send Online Alerts, Legally Purchase Guns And 375 Bullets

Illustration. (Wikimedia Commons/Tony Webster)

JAKARTA - Texas officials said the shooter at an elementary school that killed 19 students and two teachers had sent an online warning before the incident occurred.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott said the assailant had sent a message warning he was about to attack an elementary school, minutes before the attack took place.

The gunman, whose rampage ended when police killed him, had also sent a message on Tuesday saying he would shoot his grandmother, followed by another internet post confirming he had done so, Abbott said at a news conference.

The suspect's grandmother, shot in the face before her granddaughter left the house they lived in and attacked the school, managed to survive and called the police.

The gunman, identified as Salvador Ramos, 18, gave no warning that he would carry out what is now the deadliest school shooting in the US in nearly a decade, authorities said.

The shooter's online post was made on Facebook, the governor said, but a spokesman for Facebook's parent company, Meta Platforms, said it was a one-to-one private message found after the shooting. The company declined to say who received the message or which Meta platform, such as Messenger or Instagram, was used to send it.

Fleeing his grandmother's shooting, Ramos crashed his car near Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, about 80 miles (130 km) west of San Antonio, then managed to evade school police officers who were approaching him, before running in.

No gunfight took place at the time, according to police. But authorities provided few details of the incident, which is likely to be the focus of the investigation, except to say the suspect dropped a bag full of ammunition and ran towards the school when he saw the officer.

Ramos then enters the school through the back door, carries an AR-15 style rifle, and makes his way to fourth grade where he shoots everyone killed. Authorities say he legally purchased two rifles and 375 rounds of ammunition in the days before the shooting.

Meanwhile, police surrounded the building, breaking windows to help the children and staff escape. US Border Patrol agents also responded and entered the building to confront the shooter, with one agent injured "in the crossfire," homeland security officials said.

Eventually, Ramos, a high school dropout with no known criminal record or history of mental illness, was shot dead by law enforcement.

Governor Abbott added that 17 people had non-life-threatening injuries. The injured included 'several children' who survived gunfire in their classrooms, Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman Chris Olivarez said.