The mother of the 18-year-old gunman who shot dead 19 young children and two teachers and wounded many others in an elementary school in the small town of Uvalde, Texas, this week has said: “Forgive me, forgive my son.”
Adriana Martinez looked distraught as she wept in her car, telling CNN affiliate Televisa, in Spanish: “I have no words to say, I don’t know what he was thinking.”
Her interview aired on Friday as questions continued to multiply over the actions of law enforcement officials three days ago during the shooting, with gaps in the timeline and bewilderment and anger about how the gunman was inside for about an hour as armed officers held back.
“He had his reasons for doing what he did. Please don’t judge him. I only want the innocent children who died to forgive me,” she said.
Earlier this week, Salvador Ramos, who had recently turned 18, shot his grandmother, badly wounding her, before storming into Robb elementary school in Uvalde, which has a population of less than 16,000 and lies between San Antonio and the Texas-Mexico border.
He was heavily armed and had a huge stash of ammunition, and killed 19 fourth-graders aged eight to 10 and two teachers with a semi-automatic rifle, wounding about 17 others. He was ultimately shot dead by a federal agent in a classroom in which he had barricaded himself with his victims.
When asked by a reporter what Martinez would tell the families who have lost loved ones, she replied: “Forgive me, forgive my son. I know he had his reasons.”
“What reasons could he have had?” the reporter followed up.
Martinez said, weeping: “To get closer to those children instead of paying attention to the other bad things, I have no words. I don’t know.”
The gunman’s father, also called Salvador Ramos, said, in a separate interview with the Daily Beast: “I just want the people to know I’m sorry, man, [for] what my son did.
“I never expected my son to do something like that,” he said, adding: “He should’ve just killed me, you know, instead of doing something like that to someone.”
The 42-year-old father, who digs holes around utility poles for inspection, was at work when the younger Ramos stormed into the school, and only discovered what had happened when his mother called to inform him.
He began calling the local jail to ask if his son was there but soon realized that “they killed my baby, man”.
He added: “I’m never going to see my son again, just like they’re not going to see their kids. And that hurts me.”
Ramos’s maternal grandfather, Rolando Reyes, told reporters that he and his wife were living with his grandson after the grandson had problems with his mother and had dropped out of school, taking a job at a fast-food restaurant.
Reyes said his wife, Celia Martinez Gonzales, had taken their grandson to Applebee’s for dinner to celebrate his 18th birthday on 16 May. Reyes said he had no idea his grandson had bought two rifles shortly thereafter, adding that he would not have allowed it if he knew because he has a prior criminal record which prohibits him from legally having firearms in his home.
“I don’t like weapons – I cannot be around weapons,” Reyes said to ABC. “I’m against all that … I would’ve reported him.”
Reyes added that it was particularly difficult for him to grasp that his grandson had carried out the killings at Robb elementary.
“I am so sorry – I have so much pain for everyone because many of the [murdered] kids were my friends’ grandchildren, and I feel bad for all the families,” Reyes said in Spanish to Telemundo.
Reyes said he had coincidentally left his home at the time Ramos shot Celia and took off for Robb elementary. A neighbor informed him of Celia’s shooting and the killings at the school, both of which Reyes said left him beyond stunned.
“Maybe if I had been there [at home], he might’ve killed me, too,” Reyes said.
Little is known about the gunman or his motives at this stage. Some media reports citing acquaintances suggest Ramos endured taunts because of a lisp, eyeliner that he wore and some fashion choices, but investigators have not confirmed whether any of that factored into the case.
However, there were warning signs online.
There was the Instagram picture of a hand holding a gun magazine, a TikTok profile that warned: “Kids be scared,” and the image of two military-style semi-automatic assault rifles displayed on a rug, pinned to the top of the killer’s Instagram profile.
“When somebody starts posting pictures of guns they started purchasing, they’re announcing to the world that they’re changing who they are,” said Katherine Schweit, a retired FBI agent who spearheaded the agency’s active shooter program. “It absolutely is a cry for help. It’s a tease: can you catch me?”
The ominous posts, however, are often lost in an endless grid of Instagram photos that feature semi-automatic rifles, handguns and ammunition.
There is even a popular hashtag devoted to encouraging Instagram users to upload daily photos of guns, with more than 2m posts attached to it.
For law enforcement and social media companies, spotting a gun post from a potential mass shooter is like sifting through quicksand, Schweit said, and she encouraged parents, teachers, friends and those around a potential shooter to report those kinds of posts to a school counselor, the police or even the FBI tip line.
On 20 May, the day that officials say the Uvalde gunman bought a second rifle, a picture of two assault rifles appeared on his Instagram.
He tagged another Instagram user with more than 10,000 followers in the photo. In an exchange, later shared by that user, she asks why he tagged her in the photo.
“I barely know you and u tag me in a picture with some guns. It’s just scary,” she wrote.
The school district in Uvalde had spent money on software that, using geofencing technology, monitors for possible threats in the area.
Yet the gunman didn’t make a direct threat in posts, and he was legally allowed to own the weapons in Texas.
Associated Press contributed reporting