Mother recalls rescuing 2 sons from Uvalde school shooting

UVALDE, Texas (KABB/WOAI) - One Uvalde mother took matters into her own hands during the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School when she heard shots while outside the building.

Angeli Rose Gomez, the mother of two boys, says she quickly rushed to her sons’ school after hearing there was an active shooter May 24. Moments after walking up to the school, face-to-face with law enforcement, she heard gunshots, then children screaming inside.

Law enforcement was not doing what Gomez hoped, and as she tried to get them to act, she was eventually handcuffed.

Still, without a doubt in her mind, Gomez knew she would have to save her children herself. As soon as she was released from the cuffs, she jumped a fence and began banging on a nearby door, where her older son’s teacher saw her.

“You already have a gateway out, just might as well come out. If I’m going to run out with him, y’all just come on, too,” Gomez said.

Gomez safely got her older son and some of his classmates out then went back for her younger son, running around the school and desperately searching for his classroom.

Law enforcement approached her, telling her to calm down, and she demanded they start evacuating the classroom. When they did, her younger son ran out.

At their reunion, Gomez remembers the two boys hugged each other.

“One hugged the other one and said, ‘I’m so glad you’re OK.’ The other one said, ‘I was so worried that you weren’t,’” their mother said. “So, it was a big thing because in that moment, I was like, ‘They’re really happy to see each other. Thank God that… they’re alive.’”

Since that harrowing day, Gomez claims she’s been faced with scrutiny from law enforcement, even at her own home.

“The other night, we were exercising, and we had a cop parked at the corner, flickering us with his headlights,” she said.

Due to incidents like this, Gomez says she is currently separated from her boys.

“Just so my sons don’t feel like they have to watch cops passing by, stopping, parking,” she said.

Gomez has been protesting along with other community members in Uvalde’s town square, asking for Uvalde School Police Chief Pete Arredondo to be fired.

Her goal now is to file a lawsuit.

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