Teachers tell jury of their panic as they called for help during Uvalde massacre

By Shimon Prokupecz, Matthew J. Friedman, Rachel Clarke, CNN

Corpus Christi, Texas (CNN) — Three Robb Elementary teachers told jurors what they went through when a gunman came to their campus and massacred two of their colleagues and 19 students.

Two of the survivors recounted how they called 911 to get police to come and help, giving details about the shooter and where he was. One described how a student told her she was bleeding after shots came through their classroom window.

The wrenching testimony of what they were thinking and their recorded, panicked cries for help caused families watching the trial to weep, while the jury listened intently.

Thursday marked the second full day of testimony in the Texas trial of former Uvalde school district police officer Adrian Gonzales. Prosecutors argue he did not do enough to stop or delay the attack. He has pleaded not guilty to 29 counts of child abandonment or endangerment.

Two witnesses also testified about the crime scene: rifle casings found around the school and trajectory analysis on bullets that smashed through classrooms from the outside.

Prosecutors are set to continue their case Friday in Corpus Christi. Here is some of what happened on Thursday:

• Begging for help through a smart watch: Nicole Ogburn said she saw the gunman when she happened to glance out the window of her fourth-grade classroom on May 24, 2022.

“I saw a guy dressed in black. He had mid-length hair, and I saw a backpack and a gun pointed towards the playground and pavilion area,” she told the jury of seven women and five men.

She thought he would come in the entrance door closest to her classroom within seconds, and told all her students to hide.

With her phone still on her desk, Ogburn managed to use her smart watch to connect with a 911 dispatcher, telling her there was an active shooter at the school and saying a teacher had been injured in another room.

Ogburn said she hung up after giving the information, afraid the shooter would hear her and come in the room. Her call, which was played for the jury, ended with her begging in an increasingly high-pitched and emotional voice: “Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!”

The teacher said she went under furniture to be with her students and that one child tried to comfort her.

“One of my students — after I got under the curtain, I was laying on my stomach, and he crawled onto my back and laid across me and rubbed my arm, telling me, ‘Ms. Ogburn, it’s going to be OK.’”

• Injured during gunfire: Teacher Lynn Deming told the jury she feared she had put her students in danger when a gunman began shooting toward her classroom window.

She said she had hurried her fourth-grade students back from early recess and put them under a counter along an internal wall as she closed the blinds in her classroom.

“Shots went through the window and shrapnel hit me and I fell or jumped – I don’t know what I did – I lost my glasses – and then I was worried,” she told Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell, who is prosecuting Gonzales.

Deming struggled with her emotions as she testified about what she thought next.

“I thought I’d put the kids in the worst place,” she said. “Because he was shooting through the window and the kids were directly across. I thought I made the worst mistake I had ever made.”

Deming said she crawled across the room to place her body between the windows and her students, one of whom pointed out she was bleeding and had a hole in her shirt. She said she heard shots outside and then inside her building in the hallway. She told her students to pray and that she loved them.

“I wanted to tell them it would be OK, but I wasn’t sure. I just wanted the last thing they heard was that somebody loved them. I think I said it a million times.”

Deming also testified that she and her students were rescued through the window. Defense lawyer Jason Goss said one of the officers who helped evacuate classrooms was his client, Gonzales.

• Teacher describes 911 call as gunman walked to school: Family members wept in court on Thursday as they listened to a 911 call pleading for help.

The jury watched intently as witness Amy Marin described running to get her phone to call 911 about a vehicle crash, only for concern to turn to panic when the truck driver emerged with a gun.

The call played in court captured her urging children to get to their rooms, as previously reported by CNN.

Marin, who had been planning a party for her after-school class on the day of the massacre, took several moments to compose herself after listening to the call.

DA Mitchell asked Marin what happened after the gunman entered her building.

“The shots wouldn’t stop. They were just going round after round,” she said, her body shaking. “I thought he’s going to kill me; I’m going to die.”

Defense lawyer Nico LaHood asked her about the policies regarding door locks at Robb Elementary and other schools.

• Jury told to ignore teacher’s words: Emotional testimony from a Robb Elementary teacher about a gunman walking onto campus will not be considered by the jury deciding whether Gonzales could have done more to stop the massacre.

Defense lawyer Goss got witness Stephanie Hale to agree Thursday that she had not mentioned seeing the shooter or indications of gunshots when interviewed by investigators four days after the tragedy in Uvalde, Texas, in May 2022.

Hale said she met with investigators because it was mandatory, but did not think she had important information to share. She said the questions asked later, by the grand jury and by prosecutors preparing for trial, were more specific.

On Tuesday, she testified to seeing the armed man on campus, specifically in the general area where former Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District officer Gonzales would arrive — a fact the defense said had not been shared.

Gonzales is the first officer to face trial in connection with the disastrous law enforcement response to the massacre. His former boss, Pete Arredondo, has pleaded not guilty to separate charges, but a trial date has not been set.

Judge Sid Harle rejected a motion for a mistrial over the omission on Wednesday but granted the defense’s request to strike her entire testimony from the record and instructed the jury not to rely on any part of it. The prosecution objected.

“The failure to turn over that specific piece of critical evidence has put us to a disadvantage with this witness, has put us to a disadvantage with our theory,” Goss said.

“We believe that (allowing the witness testimony) will affect the due process rights of the defendant and our ability to continue in the defense of the case in the way that we had set it up and prepared for the first place.”

Harle said he would “reluctantly” instruct the jury to disregard all of Hale’s testimony.

CNN’s Shimon Prokupecz and Matthew J. Friedman reported from Corpus Christi and Rachel Clarke wrote in Atlanta.

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