21 killed as teen opens fire inside Texas school

19 children, 2 teachers dead; shooter killed by first responders

Uvalde, May 25: A tightknit Latino community in Texas was wracked with grief Wednesday after a teen in body armor marched into an elementary school and killed 19 small children and two teachers, in the latest spasm of deadly gun violence in America.

Details of the atrocity, the victims and the 18year-old suspect — who was killed by police — emerged as America grappled with its deadliest school shooting since the Sandy Hook tragedy in Connecticut a decade ago.

“This town is heartbroken, devastated,” said

Adolfo Hernandez, whose nephew was at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, a small community about an hour from the Mexican border, during the Tuesday shooting. “We feel like there’s a black cloud above this town,” he told AFP.

“You just want to pinch yourself and wake up from that horrible nightmare.”

In Uvalde, police had blocked off the area around the school on Wednesday and there was little traffic or pedestrian movement. The neighborhood is one of modest single story homes, with a small yard and often a swing set and an outdoor grill for barbecues.

Identified as Salvador Ramos, the teen gunman was a resident of the town and a US citizen.

According to Texas Department of Public Safety officials, Ramos shot his grandmother before heading to Robb Elementary School around noon where he abandoned his vehicle and entered with a handgun and a rifle, wearing body armor.

Details have emerged of the suspect as a deeply troubled teen — he was repeatedly bullied over a speech impediment that included a stutter and a lisp and once cut up his own face “just for fun,” a former friend of Ramos, Santos Valdez said.

Valdez said he used to be close to Ramos but not since the latter had begun to “deteriorate.”

The gunman was killed by responding officers, the officials said, adding later two teachers also died in the attack. —