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The tragedy has knocked on the doors of Uvalde, in the State of Texas. On Tuesday night, the name of Salvador Ramos, a young man of 18 years, was on the lips of all the inhabitants of this majority Latino community halfway between the city of San Antonio and the Mexican border. Two neighbors spoke of Ramos in front of Robb Elementary School, where the young man murdered 19 children and two teachers before being gunned down by police in the worst school shooting in a decade. “He was quiet,” Eric told this newspaper (he does not want to reveal his last name), whose eldest son studies at the same institute as Ramos. According to this neighbor, he was “good people”, but a victim of bullying in high school. “My son tells me that he knows a boy who liked to hit him,” he says.
Eric, 44, dressed in a camouflage T-shirt and cap, had a gun on his waistband. Guns are popular in Texas, a state that allows them to be carried without a special permit. And in this locality, in particular, are pistols and rifles, because there are many hunting fans.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott ruled out this Wednesday at a press conference that Ramos had a criminal record or any record of mental illness in his medical history. He also said that he had “allegedly” dropped out of the high school he attended and that he had announced and reported his plans on his Facebook account. About 30 minutes before the massacre, the attacker wrote on the social network: “I’m going to shoot my grandmother.” Moments later, he completed another publication: “I already shot my grandmother.”
According to Abbott, Ramos shot the 66-year-old woman in the face, who still managed to call the police to warn that the young man was on his way to school. Meanwhile, 15 minutes before crashing his vehicle and breaking into the school, Ramos wrote one last post: “I’m going to shoot at an elementary school.” The social network later clarified in a message on its Twitter account that the messages to which the governor referred were “private” and not public.
Lieutenant Christopher Olivarez, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, has assured the press that Ramos entered the school wearing a bulletproof vest. According to witnesses, he was armed with an automatic rifle and a pistol, and barricaded himself in a fourth-grade classroom where an end-of-year ceremony and diploma ceremony had been held minutes earlier. The school had 535 students enrolled in the school year that ended in 2021. Many of the fatalities in the shooting were 10 years old.
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Ramos lived with his two maternal grandparents, Rolando Reyes and Celia Martinez, in a single-story house a few meters from the school, on Diaz Street. His mother, Adriana Martinez, did not live with them, but in another part of town. “Her mother of hers was in bad steps,” said one of the neighbors on the street on Tuesday night, who did not want to identify himself. His father was not present in the teenager’s life. Therefore, the grandparents took care of Ramos. The area is populated by first or second generation Mexican immigrants, that is, children of migrants. Almost everyone speaks Spanish. According to Roland Gutierrez, a local senator who had access to police reports, Ramos was born in North Dakota.
According to the authorities’ account, Ramos argued with his 66-year-old grandmother before committing the crime. The young man had uploaded to social networks photographs of the weapons that he had bought legally in a local store. The grandmother, according to some neighbors, knew of her grandson’s plans and wanted to prevent her from carrying them out. Ramos shot at her. She was taken to a San Antonio hospital and is in critical condition. A backpack full of ammunition was left lying in the patio of the house.
“No one knew him”
Ramos had some jobs in town. One of them was at the Wendy’s fast food chain, where he worked for a year and left last month. The journalists who have visited the place present the portrait of a shy young man without many friends and with difficulties in establishing social relationships. “A lot of my employees talk to each other and are friendly. He wasn’t like that. I don’t think anyone knew him,” the restaurant’s night coordinator told the newspaper. The New York Times.
The boy also worked sporadically with his grandfather Rolando, who was dedicated to installing air conditioners and other maintenance tasks. In recent months, the family had mourned several upcoming deaths. Rolando had lost his mother and his brother, Salvador’s great-uncle.
“I’m very sorry for my friend Rolando,” said Adolfo Cruz, 69, who also works installing air conditioners, on Tuesday night. Originally from Uvalde, he says he has known the murderer’s family for more than 60 years. “He is a firm guy,” he describes about his grandfather, a version shared by the neighbors on the street. Adolfo’s granddaughter, 10-year-old Elija Cruz Torres, is among the fatalities left by Ramos’ anger in a place where everyone knows each other. “I don’t blame my friend at all. I don’t hold a grudge against him, ”she indicated.
What did bother Cruz is the role of the police. “Where were they?” she wondered. According to him, Police Chief Daniel Rodriguez had promised special surveillance in the school district. In May 2018, the authorities of this town arrested two students from the Morales institute, aged 13 and 14, who planned to carry out a shooting in their center, in the same town. The investigation revealed that the minors identified themselves with Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the Columbine killers. Years later, a massacre has taken place inside the classrooms. The name of Salvador Ramos joins a growing list of perpetrators that once again joins an entire community in mourning.
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