Texas law enforcement official defends police inaction: 'They could've been shot'

A Texas law enforcement official defended the lack of response by Uvalde police officers after a gunman walked into an elementary school and started murdering children.

Texas DPS Lt. Chris Olivarez agreed during an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer that state guidelines call for officers to disable an active shooter as quickly as possible, with or without backup, but also said police were concerned about the gunman's threat to them, reported the Houston Chronicle.

"In the active shooter situation, you want to stop the killing, you want to preserve life," Olivarez said. "But also one thing that, of course, the American people need to understand is that officers are making entry into this building. They do not know where the gunman is. They are hearing gunshots. They are receiving gunshots."

"At that point," Olivarez added, "if they proceeded any further not knowing where the suspect was at, they could've been shot, they could've been killed, and at that point that gunman would have had an opportunity to kill other people inside that school, so they were able to contain the gunman inside that classroom so that he was not able to go to any other portions of the school to commit any other killings."

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