A new report on the Robb Elementary shooting released from the Texas House’s investigative committee recently provides shocking information about the shooter’s past, revealing that others were calling him a “school shooter” months prior to the massacre in Uvalde.
The alleged gunman, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, fatally shot 19 students and two teachers. He also injured several others, including his grandmother, Celia Gonzales.
The conclusions are supported by information from the shooter’s phone, interviews with family members conducted by law enforcement, and testimonies heard by the committee.
Salvador’s online gaming friends had a running joke about him being the “school shooter” a year before the teen committed the Uvalde school shooting. Additionally, he had begun to terrorize women with graphic descriptions of rape and violence while dressing in all black and issuing outlandish threats.
Although he was raised in Uvalde, Texas, with his sister and his mother, who battled a lengthy history of drug use, he was actually born in Fargo, North Dakota.
Salvador was quiet and reserved, and according to relatives, he avoided social situations due to a speech impediment. His pre-K teacher described him as a “wonderful student” who was always eager to learn and had a pleasant attitude when he first started school.
Then, a change occurred. In the third grade, he was labeled as “at-risk,” and speech therapy was recommended for him, but he never received the special education services and started falling behind in class, according to the report.
His stutter, short hair, and wardrobe led to bullying throughout the fourth grade, according to family and friends who spoke before the committee. The Uvalde gunman frequently wore the same outfit every day. A cousin claimed that once, a girl hooked his shoelaces together, causing him to fall on his face.
His fourth-grade teacher informed the committee that she knew the attacker needed additional support in her class because he stated to have been the victim of bullying. She said she thought Salvador had a nice year overall, using her classroom as a safe haven.
In addition to earning poor grades, Salvador began skipping school, recording more than 100 absences per year beginning in 2018. However, the report’s authors stated they were unsure whether a school resource officer ever went to his home. The suspect had barely finished ninth grade by 2021, when he was 17 years old, according to the report.
He stopped attending school altogether when students returned to in-person classes after taking online classes during the pandemic. He became more isolated and turned to the online world instead of trying to fit in, as he had done in the past. On October 28, he was forcibly dismissed by Uvalde High School officials due to “poor academic performance and lack of attendance.”
Salvador had essentially no school disciplinary history, according to the report. His only offense occurred in 2018 when he engaged in “mutual combat” with another student, which led to a three-day suspension.
The FBI interviewed a former girlfriend of the shooter, who said she suspected the shooter’s mother had a boyfriend who sexually assaulted the suspect when he was young. Still, his mother disregarded his complaints, according to the investigation.
In the latter part of 2021, Salvador’s girlfriend ended their relationship. The girl informed the FBI in the interview that Salvador began harassing her and her friends. He constantly told her that he wouldn’t live past the age of 18, either because he would kill himself or because he “wouldn’t live long.”
She stated he was depressed and lonely and that his friends regularly called him a “school shooter.”
He began to express an interest in gore and violent sex online, according to the report’s authors, occasionally posting videos and pictures of suicides and beheadings. When he lost while playing online games, he became furious and threatened other players, particularly women.
In his private writings, he expressed his difficulty empathizing with or relating with others and said he was “not human.” Based on his search history, he may have been seeking information on whether he was a sociopath, according to the report.
Due to those searches, he also received an email about how to get sociopathy psychiatric treatment.
The pattern of attacking women continued. He lost his job at a Whataburger after one month of employment for threatening a female coworker. Then, he eventually lost his job at Wendy’s.
Living at home allowed him to save money despite losing his jobs. He purchased shin guards, a red dot sight, rifle slings, and a body armor carrier before the end of 2021 when the first indications of his plans started to emerge. The Uvalde gunman was still only 17 at the time, so he could not legally purchase the firearms, and at least two people he asked to help him purchase the weapons turned him down.
“The attacker developed a fascination with school shootings, of which he made no secret,” according to the report. “His comments about them, coupled with his wild threats of violence and rape, earned him the nickname “Yubo’s school shooter” on that platform.”
Salvador posted a video online in late 2021 showing himself being driven around by a person he met online while holding a plastic bag containing a dead cat. The driver laughed as he later flung the bag onto the roadway and spat on it.
The video ends with him pointing a BB gun at people and claiming his driver was to blame for a serious car accident as first responders arrived on the scene.
None of his online activities, according to the committee’s report, was reported to law enforcement. “If it was reported by other users to any social media platform, it does not appear that actions were taken to restrict his access or to report him to authorities as a threat,” stated the report.
Although a school shooting may have crossed the attacker’s mind as early as late 2021, the committee’s findings noted that he only started carrying out his plan in early 2022, following a fight with his mother.
At that point, he live-streamed their disagreement on Instagram, which other family members witnessed. Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to the residence after a call. However, no arrests were made. Salvador then moved into his grandmother’s home shortly after.
He had not seen his father in roughly a month before the mass massacre and felt a similar hostility toward him. The father saw the gunman had apparent self-inflicted cuts on his face, and Salvador reportedly said he was “doing something” soon.
Salvador confessed his desire to end his life to an elder cousin who was also staying with their grandmother. The relative, however, thought she succeeded in getting through to him after a long “heart-to-heart.”
Instead, starting in February, he increased his purchases of handgun accessories, such as 60 30-round magazines. On May 16, when he turned 18, he began purchasing weapons and ammunition. Finally, he spent thousands of dollars on two rifles in the AR-15 design. The committee discovered that he spent over $6,000 in total.
The shooter wrote, “I got a lil secret,” the day before the shooting in a Snapchat message to a German teen he befriended.
She asked what, and he responded that it was “impossible for today” since he was still awaiting a scheduled delivery at 7 p.m. Later that day, he received his 1,740 hollow points order.
