Texas DPS Director Steve McCraw testifies in front of grand jury in Uvalde in response to DOJ report

UVALDE, Texas – Texas DPS Director Steve McCraw testified in front of a grand jury in Uvalde on Wednesday morning in response to the scathing Department of Justice report on the Robb Elementary shooting.

McCraw arrived in Uvalde via airplane around 8:30 a.m. and gave grand jury statements at the Uvalde County Fairplex. He left the facility in a blacked-out SUV and departed from the Uvalde airport just after 11 a.m.

While details of his statement will remain private, sources told KSAT McCraw insisted on testifying in front of the grand jury.

“I’m expecting him to say ‘oh we did no wrong and DPS as an institution did not do anything wrong’, except we’ve already seen over and over and over and you see it in the DOJ report that they failed,” Brett Cross, guardian of Uziyah Garcia said.

Cross didn’t sugarcoat his expectations of McCraw’s visit and the grand jury’s procedure.

“I think that this is all just a ploy to get people’s hopes up and to say oh, yeah me as the DA, I’m doing something when in all reality and actuality she isn’t doing anything,” Cross said.

Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell called the grand jury last month, one day after the Department of Justice released its critical incident report into the failed law enforcement response at Robb Elementary School on May 24, 2022.

The shooter killed 19 fourth-grade students and two teachers. First responders waited 77 minutes to take down the gunman.

DPS turned over investigative material to Mitchell more than a year ago.

Now, the grand jury is looking over that material and calling law enforcement members to testify. The grand jury will determine if any criminal charges will be filed.

That’s what Berlinda Arreola is hoping for.

“Minimal, you know some type of punishment, terminations, suspensions, something. But max, charges,” Arreola, stepgrandmother of Amerie Jo Garza said.

The legal team for CLEAT, the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas, said it would provide representation for officers called to give grand jury statements.

“Expecting the worst but hoping for the best because at this point we really haven’t gotten anywhere. We’re still stuck on May 24th, nothing has changed,” Arreola said.

Like Cross, Arreola is also skeptical of McCraw’s visit to Uvalde.

”I want to hope that he came to do the right thing. In the past, you know, 22 months almost it’s kind of hard to trust anything that McCraw says unfortunately but I’m hoping that he came to do the right thing,” she said.

Read more:

• DOJ report: Officers missed 10 opportunities to stop Robb Elementary gunman
• Uvalde CISD holds safety and security meeting after DOJ report calls out failures in the district
• Families of Robb Elementary shooting victims respond to blistering DOJ report on law enforcement response