‘He told my teacher goodnight, and shot her in the head’: Uvalde survivor, 11, recounts massacre
‘He told my teacher goodnight, and shot her in the head’: Uvalde massacre survivor, 11, tells Congress she ‘grabbed blood and put it all over’ her Lilo and Stitch shirt because she thought gunman would return and says ‘it will happen again’
Uvalde school shooting survivor Miah Cerrillo, 11, recounted to Congress on Wednesday the massacre at her elementary school last month ‘[He] told my teacher ‘goodnight’ and shot her in the head,’ Cerrillo explained of the mass shooting‘I thought he was going to come back to the room,’ she said in pre-recorded remarks played before the panel. ‘So I grabbed the blood and I put it all over me’The shooting in Uvalde, Texas last month left 19 students and two teachers dead and many more injured A separate shooting at a Buffalo, New York supermarket that left 10 people dead
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Uvalde school shooting survivor Miah Cerrillo, 11, recounted to Congress on Wednesday the horror of the massacre where she covered herself in blood to trick the shooter into thinking she was dead.
The fourth grader insisted during a hearing to the House Oversight and Reform Committee that there will be more school shootings and said that she doesn’t feel safe at school because she thinks it will happen again.
In her harrowing pre-recorded testimony Cerrillo revealed how she watched her teacher get shot in the head, and saw her friend gunned down before covering her Lilo and Stitch shirt in her classmate’s blood.
The youngster also pleaded for more safety in schools after the pediatrician who cared for her after the massacre told the hearing how she was sitting in the hospital emergency room in shock and was shaking because of the adrenaline.
Cerrillo was speaking alongside relatives of victims of the Uvalde and Buffalo massacres, doctors, and experts in gun safety as Congress tries to come to a deal on gun control legislation in closed-door negotiations.
‘[The shooter] shot the little window and then he moved to the other classrooms and then he went – there’s a door between our classrooms – and he went through there. Then shot my teacher and told my teacher ‘goodnight’ and shot her in the head,’ Cerrillo explained of the mass shooting.
‘And then he shot some of my classmates and the white board. When I went to the backpacks, he shot my friend that was next to me and I thought he was going to come back to the room,’ she continued in pre-recorded remarks that were played before the panel .’So I grabbed the blood and I put it all over me.’
‘I stayed quiet and then I got my teachers’ phone and called 9-1-1… and told her that we need help,’ Cerrillo said, claiming at that point police came to her classroom.
On May 24, 2022, Salvador Ramos, 18, opened fire at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 elementary-aged students and two teachers and injuring several others. Before going to the school he shot his grandmother – who survived.
Ramos was shot dead by law enforcement.
Uvalde school shooting survivor Miah Cerrillo, 11, recounted to Congress on Wednesday the massacre at her elementary school last month that left 21 people dead and many more injured
Democratic Representative Robin Kelly of Illinois wiped tears from her eyes Wednesday during Cerrillo’s testimony about the massacre in Uvalde
‘[He] told my teacher ‘goodnight’ and shot her in the head,’ Cerrillo explained in pre-recorded testimony played before the panel on Wednesday. ‘I thought he was going to come back to the room. So I grabbed the blood and I put it all over me’
The Robb Elementary School student’s father appeared before the House Oversight Committee to briefly speak on the tragedy following two mass shooting last month
Cerrillo pleaded for more security at her school, nodding her head when her father asked if she thought ‘it’s going to happen again.’
In the second part of the hearing, lawmakers on the panel were given the opportunity to question experts in the field both in favor of and opposed to implementing stricter gun reform laws.
Progressive Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez during that period of the hearing called it ‘globally embarrassing’ that the U.S. has so many mass shootings – and in particular shootings at schools.
‘Between 2009 and 2018, how many school shootings did the US have?’ the New York lawmakers asked Rebecca Pringle, president of the national education association.
Pringle replied: ‘288.’
‘Now let’s look globally,’ Ocasio-Cortez said. ‘Our G-7 partners – Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom – combined, how many school shootings did those countries have?’
‘Five – 50 times more,’ the witness said.
‘In almost 10 years – 288 versus 5. This is not normal,’ the congresswoman insisted.
‘Not only is it not normal, it is internationally embarrassing and delegitimizing to the United States,’ she continued. ‘Because for all the billions and trillions this body authorizes in the name of national security, we can’t even keep our kids safe from their schools being turned into a war zone.’
Another panel member, Democratic Representative Katie Porter of California, insisted that guns be regulated like other consumer products – specifically pointing to Peloton exercise equipment.
Porter said that in the span of five years between 2015 and 2020 there were at least 2,070 unintentional shootings by children, which led to childrens’ deaths in 765 of those cases.
‘A consumer product that causes this much harm to the public would normally be subject to a recall,’ Porter said.
‘After one child died using a Peloton treadmill last year, the Consumer Product Safety Commission intervened and recalled the product,’ she added. ‘But when hundreds of children die using guns, there is no federal response.’
Federal law prohibits the Consumer Product Safety Commission from regulating guns and Porter noted that it is ‘absurd’ there are currently no federal safety standards when it comes to firearms.
She said the Consumer Product Safety Commission is ‘the agency responsible for protecting the public from dangerous products’ and insinuated firearms should fall into that category for regulation.
Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician in Uvalde, Texas, testified before the committee during the first part on Wednesday and detailed his care of Cerrillo and other children rushed to the hospital in the aftermath of the shooting.
‘As I entered the chaos of the ER, the first casualty I came across was Miah Cerrillo,’ Guerrero recalled. ‘She was sitting in the hallway, her face was still clearly in shock but her whole body was shaking from the adrenaline coursing through it.’
‘The white Lilo and Stitch shirt that she wore was covered in blood and her shoulder was bleeding from a shrapnel injury,’ he said.
‘Sweet Miah, I knew her my whole life,’ the doctor added during his in-person opening statement to the Oversight panel. ‘As a baby she survived major liver surgeries against all odds. And, once again, she’s here as a survivor. Inspiring her with her story today and her bravery.’
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called it ‘internationally embarrassing’ for the U.S. to spend ‘billions and trillions in the name of national security’ and ‘we can’t even keep our kids safe from their schools being turned into a war zone’
Democratic Representative Katie Porter of California insisted Wednesday during the hearing that guns need to be regulated like other consumer products – specifically pointing to Peloton exercise equipment
Those students who were killed in the shooting are Nevaeh Bravo, 10; Jackie Cazares, 9; Makenna Lee Elrod, 10; Jose Manuel Flores Jr., 10; Eliahna ‘Ellie’ Amyah Garcia, 9; Uziyah Garcia; Amerie Jo Garza, 10; Xavier Lopez, 10; Jayce Carmelo Luevanos, 10; Tess Marie Mata, 10; Maranda Mathis, 11; Alithia Ramirez, 10; Annabell Guadalupe Rodriguez, 10; Maite Yuleana Rodriguez, 10; Alexandria ‘Lexi’ Aniyah Rubio, 10; Layla Salazar, 11; Jailah Nicole Silguero, 10; Eliahna A. Torres, 10; Rojelio Torres, 10
The teachers killed are Irma Garcia, 48, and Eva Mireles, 44.
Other witnesses for the hearing testifying on gun violence before the congressional oversight committee were the mother of a 21-year-old shot in the Buffalo, New York mass shooting last month, Cerrillo’s father and Kimberly and Felix Rubio, the parents of one of the deceased from the Uvalde school shooting.
Lacretica Hughes also spoke to the committee from the witness table about her son, Emanuel, who was shot in the head and killed at a party in April.
Hughes had a different tune than some of the other parents at the hearing on Wednesday, claiming that if Democrats take away guns and also defund the police, who will be left to protect vulnerable communities.
She said that a ‘thousand more laws’ won’t ‘stop criminals from committing these crimes.’
‘How about letting me defend myself from evil?’ she question of her Second Amendment right to own a firearm. ‘You don’t think that I’m capable and trustworthy to handle a firearm? You don’t think that the Second Amendment doesn’t apply to people that look like me.’
‘And you who are called for more gun controls are the same ones that are calling to defund police,’ Hughes alleged. ‘Who was supposed to protect us?’
Miah Cerrillo is an 11-year-old who was at the end of her fourth grade school year at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas when the shooting happened last month
Cerrillo took no definitive stance on gun control, instead mourning the person his daughter used to be before the shooting.
‘I come because I love my baby girl – but she is not the same little girl that I used to play with and run with and do everything because she was daddy’s little girl. I have five kids and she is the middle child. I don’t know what to do,’ he pleaded during Wednesday’s hearing.
The Rubio parents, who have five other children who attended Uvalde public schools, gave live testimony virtually.
They demanded a ‘ban on assault rifles and high capacity magazines.’
‘We understand that for some reason to some people – to people with money, to people who fund political campaigns – that guns are more important than children,’ Mrs. Rubio pleaded through tears.
‘So at this moment, we ask for progress.’
Parents of Alexandria ‘Lexi’ Aniyah Rubio, 10, who was killed in the shooting, testified virtually before the Oversight Committee on Wednesday and demanded a ‘ban on assault rifles and high capacity magazines’
On May 24, 2022, Salvador Ramos, 18, (pictured) opened fire at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 elementary students and two teachers
Mass shootings on May 15 and May 24 – just nine days apart – left 31 people dead.
The first was in Buffalo, New York at a Tops Supermarket in a predominately black community where a racist 18-year-old, Payton Gendron, walked into the store and gunned down 13 people – leaving 10 dead. Eleven of the 13 shot were black.
A little over a week later, Ramos, who is also 18, shot up Robb Elementary School, killing 21 people.
The two mass shootings, coupled with a nationwide rise in crime since President Joe Biden took office, has led to increased calls for more gun control legislation that most Republicans argue would further restrict Americans’ Second Amendment Rights.
Main priorities of Democrats appear to be raising the age to purchase firearms – specifically semi-automatic rifles – from 18 to 21, increasing background check requirements and implementing red flag laws that prevent certain individuals from purchasing a gun.
In response to spiking gun violence and mass shooting, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is bringing eight firearms-related legislation to the floor on Wednesday, and urged all those in her caucus to vote in favor of the reform bills.
‘It’s sickening that our children are forced to live in this constant fear,’ Pelosi said from the House floor on Wednesday as she spoke about gun control legislation ahead of impending votes.
The package of bills includes provisions to limit magazine sizes, increase the age to buy semi-automatic ‘assault style’ rifles, set standards for gun storage and codify regulations on ghost guns and bump stocks.
