HOUSTON – The families who lost children during the Robb Elementary School shooting are unhappy with the Washington Post. The newspaper known as WaPo released pictures of the tragic shooting that occurred in May of 2022.
On that frightful day in Uvalde, 19 students and two teachers died. Another 17 others were injured and survived. The families have been asking for more than a year for a detailed report and photos, but they routinely got shut down.
The photos were released in a series of reports called “Terror on Repeat,” a series looking into mass shootings involving assault rifles during the past 11 years.
On Thursday, WaPo Executive Editor Sally Buzbee shared in an article: “Our decision to publish this story came after careful and extensive deliberation among the reporters and editors who worked on it, as well as senior leaders in our newsroom.”
During that discussion, Buzbee said the paper decided to show the devastation left in the wake of mass shootings involving AR-15s.
“The families are very upset about the Washington Post article, in which crime scene images are shown that they believe were leaked from DPS,” said Laura Lee Prather with Hanes Boone Law Firm.
In a motion filed with the courts, the Texas Department of Safety told families that photos from the tragedy couldn’t be released to them, but they were given to the attorneys under a “your eyes only” guideline.
“They are arguing to the court that DPS cannot both say that all of this information is private while simultaneously leaking it to the media,” she goes on to say.
The main article showing the photos requires some intent by the user to see the mass shooting images. Over a darkened image of an AR-15, promptly in the middle of the page is an editor’s note stating, “The photos, videos and personal accounts below are extremely disturbing and may be too upsetting for some people.”
Some of the aftermath shootings, including body bags from Robb Elementary, are then shown.
Prather says the families are now demanding the release of an unredacted version of the Texas Ranger report and an investigation into who leaked the images.
Buzbee states in her article that many of the images and videos they obtained are from public records requests.
Press Secretary Ericka Miller with the Texas Department of Public Safety tells us, “DPS photographs were not released by the department but were separately obtained by the Washington Post.”
When asked who DPS believes released the photos, Miller said, “We are not going to comment on that.”
The Hanes Boone Law Firm firm looks to put in a motion for final judgment in their original case for the families sometime on Friday.