Frank Salazar, 18, had woken up Wednesday morning ready to turn the page, but when he looked out the window he realized that his plans were not going to come true.
A river of police vans, ambulances and the media crowd the street of his house, about 300 meters from Robb Primary School, where another 18-year-old, Salvador Ramos, shot dead 19 children and two teachers on Tuesday. .
“We are in shock.
This is a small town.
The duel will last for months or years, ”says Salazar one day after the tragedy in the garden of his house.
In Uvalde, a small rural town of 16,000 inhabitants in the center of the State of Texas, everything is close, everyone knows each other and nobody expected something like this to happen to them.
Salazar studied at Robb Elementary and a couple of streets above his house is the institute where he shared a class with the murderer, who was shot by police during Tuesday's incident.
Both were to graduate at the same ceremony this week.
The flowers that the neighbors have been depositing at the entrance of the school cover the sign in Spanish: “Welcome”.
An hour and a half drive from the Mexican border, more than three quarters of the town are of Latino origin.
“We are a small, cohesive community.
We are all mixed and we are good neighbors.
That is why it was unthinkable that they would kill our children.
But the devil never sleeps”, says Nehli García, 63 years old who arrived as a child with her grandmother and her parents from the Mexican state of Zacatecas.
Garcia lives in another of the one-story prefabricated houses in this middle-class neighborhood of town.
She knows the school well because she works as a porter and many days she brought the mail to the school.
“Before here you could hear the children screaming, laughing.
He was full of life.
Now the whole town is silent.”
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Follow the last hour of the Uvalde massacre here
In the town's main square, a 10-minute drive from the school, some residents are silently protesting with handwritten banners bearing messages of pain and anger.
Looking straight at the courts, Florina Ávila has come with her five-year-old daughter and a sign: "remember their names."
She doesn't want to talk.
She considers that there is not much more to say.
Uziyah García, the youngest victim, was only eight years old.
"He was the most affectionate child you can imagine," the boy's grandfather told the press on the day of the murder, who in his short life had had time to be a baseball fan.
"This community is in complete
shock
," Governor Greg Abbott said Wednesday.
In a visit to the scene of the tragedy, the Republican politician did not point to the facilities to get weapons as the person responsible for the massacre, but to mental health problems.
“The physical injuries of the wounded will heal, but the emotional wounds are hard to see and take longer,” said Abbott, a strong supporter of the gun
lobby
and whose administration has loosened gun regulation.
At the conference of the governor of Texas, tensions that dominate the national debate on how to end the tragic - and habitual - shootings in schools or other establishments surfaced.
A man stood up to question Abbott and ask him why he wasn't doing anything to stop the violence.
"Sir, he's out of line," Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin yelled at him.
The man questioning the governor for answers was Beto O'Rourke, the former Democratic mayor of El Paso and Abbot's rival in the November gubernatorial election.
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Salvador Ramos, the author of the shooting in Texas, a withdrawn young man who spread terror in a Uvalde school
“I can't believe that a son of a bitch like you is going to make this a political issue of this.
They are assholes like you, get out of here”, they yelled at him from the entourage, almost all sympathizers of the Republican Party.
O'Rourke was escorted out of the room.
This Tuesday is the eighth mass shooting - that is, with more than three fatalities - in just over a decade in Texas.
Jesse, who also lives right across from Robb School, says he has never experienced anything like it.
The closest thing that the residents of the area experienced are “three or four” chases by the border patrol agents of undocumented immigrants.
The border with the Mexican state of Coahuila, an important step for those seeking to reach the United States, is only a few kilometers away.
One of these hunts ended near his house.
“I remember that there was a girl who was badly beaten and that I told the agents if she could give her water… But they had not come to shoot up the school,” she assured.
photo gallery
Victims of the shooting in Uvalde, Texas
Shawn, a 19-year-old, just a year older than the murderer, came to school on Wednesday afternoon, magnetized by the tragedy.
The young man, white and living on the outskirts of town, traveled to the place of horror that marks so many towns and cities in the United States.
“So much happens… The media, the police come.
Democrats will clash with Republicans over guns.
They all promise that something will change.
And then we all forget until it happens again.
Everything repeats itself, ”he assured as he tried to hold back his tears.
His family, he says, doesn't like having guns in the house.
But they are an exception.
“It's a very widespread culture in Texas.
Everybody loves them."
Frank Salazar, the killer's classmate, shares a similar opinion.
“I have no problem with weapons.
But I do think there should be more controls.”
In a new tragedy that has shocked the United States, an 18-year-old broke into Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 children and two teachers. Jordan Vonderhaar (Getty)
More than a dozen children were injured in the attack.
At Robb Elementary School, nearly 90% of its 500 students are Hispanic from families of modest economic means. NURI VALLBONA (REUTERS)
A girl cries, comforted by two adults, outside the Willie de Leon Civic Center, where grief counseling is offered in the Uvalde community. ALLISON DINNER (AFP)
The event coincides with the publication of a report that reveals that shootings have multiplied in the United States in 2021. An FBI count indicates that last year there were 61 such episodes, compared to 40 in 2020. ALLISON DINNER ( AFP)
San Antonio Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller comforts families outside the Uvalde Civic Center. Dario Lopez-Mills (AP)
The President of the United States, Joe Biden, has made an institutional declaration of mourning and solidarity with families.
“It is time to act, it is time to say to those who obstruct, delay or block common sense laws (in reference to the legislation on weapons).
We will not forget ”, he has said energetically this Tuesday. Manuel Balce Ceneta (AP)
Mass shootings, and especially those that take place in schools, have fueled the debate on the controls on the sale and use of firearms.
"Enough is enough, we have to have the courage to take action," said Vice President Kamala Harris, after noting that she was "heartbroken" by the tragedy. NURI VALLBONA (REUTERS)
The United States, where the right to possess firearms is constitutionally enshrined, is the only country in the world in which massacres by firearms in schools and institutes are repeated on a recurring basis.AARON M. SPRECHER (EFE)
The mass shooting in Uvalde is the second-largest shooting at a US college in the last decade.
The largest was the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, Connecticut, when a 20-year-old man killed 26 people, including 20 children ages 6 and 7. NURI VALLBONA (REUTERS)
Children, with flowers outside the Willie de Leon Civic Center, where students were transported from Robb Elementary School after the shooting. MARCO BELLO (REUTERS)
By order of President Joe Biden, this Wednesday, May 25, the American flags will fly at half-staff.
In the image, the main banner of the White House. Alex Brandon (AP)
The American press is already providing the first names of the victims of the massacre, after their relatives shared images and memories on social networks. ALLISON DINNER (AFP)
Mourners attend a vigil at Sacred Heart Catholic Church for the victims of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School. Jordan Vonderhaar (Getty Images)
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