A memorial dedicated to the 19 children and two adults murdered on May 24, 2022 during a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School is seen on January 06, 2026 in Uvalde, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
Editor’s note: Some of the testimony described below is extremely graphic.
(UVALDE, Texas) — Robb Elementary School teacher Elsa Avila was taking photos of her fourth-graders with their science projects on May 24, 2022, when she said a young girl noticed something was wrong — that other students was running to their classroom and screaming.
Avila testified that her students immediately hid, as they had during lockdown training.
“We heard loud, loud shots in the hallway,” Avila said on Tuesday at the trial of former Uvalde, Texas, school police officer Adrian Gonzales. “They knew that it was, you know, a real thing.”
When Avila briefly stood up to instruct her students to make sure everyone was “safe and out of sight,” she said she felt a piercing pain on her left side.
“I felt the burning pain,” she said. “I put my hand on my side and I saw blood. When I took my hand away, I saw blood. So, I knew that I had been shot.”
As she recounted her injury, Avila banged her hands on the witness stand — the wood ringing from her Rosary ring — to describe the sounds she heard.
“I fell to the floor, and we kept hearing the shots,” she said.
Avila said she was lying on the floor in intense pain and “trying so hard to keep it in.”
She said her students tried to comfort her while they sheltered in place.
“They were hugging each other. They were helping each other stay quiet. Some of them were tapping me. They were telling me, ‘Miss, Miss. We love you. We love you. You’re going to be OK, you’re going to be OK,'” she testified.
Avila’s harrowing testimony comes on the second week of Gonzales’ trial. Prosecutors allege Gonzales, who is charged with child endangerment, did not follow his training and endangered the 19 students who died and an additional 10 surviving students.
Gonzales has pleaded not guilty and his lawyers argue he is being unfairly blamed for a broader law-enforcement failure that day. It took 77 minutes before law enforcement mounted a counterassault to end the May 2022 rampage.
Avila maintained her composure throughout most of her testimony, though she broke down in tears when she described what she felt in those moments.
“I was in so much pain towards the end there, my body was going into shock, and my legs were already starting to shake. My whole body was starting to shake,” she said. “I kept praying, you know, God, please don’t let me die.”
During a brief cross examination, Avila testified about hearing officers trying to negotiate with the gunman.
“I heard a voice saying, you know, ‘Sir, we need you to stop, we don’t want anyone else to get hurt,'” she said.
Avila testified that, even when officers broke through her classroom windows to begin rescuing students, some students wanted to stay with her due to her injury.
Former fourth-grade teacher Arnulfo Reyes also testified on Monday and Tuesday, recounting in excruciating detail the moments when gunman Salvador Ramos shot and wounded him and shot and killed all 11 children in his classroom.
Reyes said he fell to the ground after he was struck by gunfire. Then, the shooter “came around and he shot the kids,” Reyes testified, maintaining his composure.
After the first series of gunshots, Reyes testified that a student in a nearby classroom mistook Ramos for police.
“A student from that classroom said, ‘Officer, come in here. We’re in here,'” Reyes testified. “And I heard he walked over there, and I heard more shooting.”
As Reyes lay on the ground bleeding from wounds to his arm and back, he said the shooter returned to his classroom and noticed he was still alive.
“He came and he tried to taunt me. He got some of my blood and splashed it on my face,” he said.
During cross-examination, defense lawyer Nico LaHood tried to deflect some blame from Gonzales, suggesting Reyes was at least partially at fault for leaving his classroom door unlocked the morning of the shooting.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks at a press conference during moving day at Gracie Mansion on January 12, 2026 in New York City. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — A New York City Council employee was detained during a “routine” immigration appointment on Long Island on Monday, according to city officials, who called the incident an “egregious government overreach.”
Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he is “outraged” by the worker’s arrest.
“This is an assault on our democracy, on our city, and our values,” he said in a statement on X. “I am calling for his immediate release and will continue to monitor the situation.”
The Department of Homeland Security defended the arrest late Monday, saying the employee is in the U.S. illegally and has an alleged criminal history that includes an arrest for assault. The agency did not provide additional details on the assault arrest.
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin identified the employee in a statement Monday night as Rafael Andres Rubio Bohorquez, whom she alleged is a “criminal illegal alien from Venezuela.”
McLaughlin said Rubio Bohorquez entered the U.S. on a B2 tourist visa in 2017 that required him to leave the country by Oct. 22, 2017.
“He had no legal right to be in the United States,” McLaughlin said in a statement. “Under Secretary Noem, criminal illegal aliens are not welcome in the United States. If you come to our country illegally and break our law, we will find you and we will arrest you.”
The employee was detained by federal immigration officials during an appointment in Bethpage in Nassau County earlier Monday, according to NYCCouncil Speaker Julie Menin.
The speaker said the employee has legal authorization to remain in the country until this coming October.
Menin said the employee is a “central staff member working as a data analyst for approximately a year.”
The city council learned of his detainment Monday afternoon, when the employee used his one phone call to contact the council’s human resources department for help and said he had been detained, according to Menin.
“DHS confirmed that this employee had gone in for a routine court appointment and was nevertheless detained. They provided no other basis for his detainment,” Menin said during a press briefing on Monday. “On the contrary, he was a city council employee who is doing everything right. He went to the court when he was asked.”
Menin said the city council is demanding the return of the employee, whom she did not identify, citing privacy concerns.
Democratic New York Congressman Dan Goldman said the employee is of Venezuelan descent and is a “law-abiding immigrant with work authorization.”
“I want to be very clear: There is no indication that there’s anything about this individual other than his immigration status that caused him to be arrested,” he said during Monday’s press briefing.
DHS said the staffer was not authorized to work in the U.S.
The employee has been transferred to a detention center in Manhattan, according to Menin. She said the city council has been unable to reach his family members.
Goldman said his office has reached out to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“We will continue to fight this,” he said. “We will continue to push for not only this person’s release, which is so obviously necessary, but for this immigration dragnet to stop.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James also called for the staffer’s immediate release, saying in a statement on X, “We will not stand for attacks on our city, its public servants, and its residents.”
In response to the incident, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said, “This is exactly what happens when immigration enforcement is weaponized.”
“Detaining people during routine court appearances doesn’t make us safer,” she said in a statement on X. “It erodes trust, spreads fear, and violates basic principles of fairness.”
A memorial dedicated to the 19 children and two adults murdered on May 24, 2022 during a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School is seen on January 06, 2026 in Uvalde, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
Editor’s note: Some of the testimony described below is extremely graphic.
(UVALDE, Texas) — As the sound of gunshots got closer to Room 111 in Robb Elementary School, former fourth-grade teacher Arnulfo Reyes testified that all he could do was tell his students to get under their desks, stay quiet and close their eyes.
“I had told them to close their eyes, because I didn’t want them to see if something bad was going to happen,” Reyes testified Monday at the trial of former Uvalde, Texas, school police officer Adrian Gonzales.
Prosecutors allege Gonzales, who is charged with child endangerment, did not follow his training and endangered the 19 students who died and an additional 10 surviving students. Gonzales has pleaded not guilty and his lawyers argue he is being unfairly blamed for a broader law-enforcement failure that day. It took 77 minutes before law enforcement mounted a counterassault to end the May 2022 rampage.
In excruciating detail, Reyes recounted the tragic moments when gunman Salvador Ramos shot and wounded him and shot and killed all 11 children in his classroom.
Reyes said he fell to the ground after he was struck by gunfire. Then, the shooter “came around and he shot the kids,” Reyes testified, maintaining his composure.
After the first series of gunshots, Reyes testified that a student in a nearby classroom mistook Ramos for police.
“A student from that classroom said, ‘Officer, come in here. We’re in here,'” Reyes testified. “And I heard he walked over there, and I heard more shooting.”
As Reyes lay on the ground bleeding from wounds to his arm and back, he said the shooter returned to his classroom and noticed he was still alive.
“He came and he tried to taunt me. He got some of my blood and splashed it on my face,” he said.
Reyes acknowledged that his sense of time from the shooting was unclear.
“I’m not sure how long, I just know it felt like forever,” he said, adding that all he could do in those moments was pray.
“I just closed my eyes real tight and just waited for everything to be over,” he said.
During cross-examination, defense lawyer Nico LaHood tried to deflect some blame from Gonzales, suggesting Reyes was at least partially at fault for leaving his classroom door unlocked the morning of the shooting.
Reyes will be back on the stand on Tuesday.
Though Reyes did not mention Gonzales by name during Monday’s testimony, the former teacher offered the jury one of the most graphic accounts of the shooting.
Former acting Dallas District Attorney Messina Madson told ABC News that prosecutors are likely attempting to use emotional testimony to emphasize the scope of the tragedy and to argue that someone other than the shooter should bear responsibility for the tragedy.
“This is an unusual way to apply this law, and so from an overall point of view of what the district attorney’s office is trying to do is say this is a tragedy,” Madson said. “This is a terrible, horrible thing that happened, and it is so horrible that not only do we have to mourn it, but somebody is criminally responsible, besides the person who pulled the trigger.”
David Barnes appears in court in Russia on Feb. 13, 2024 (ABC News)
(NEW YORK) — Paul Carter and his friend David Barnes have been speaking with each other since their days in first grade in Huntsville, Alabama, more than 60 years ago.
Yet since Jan. 13, 2022, their conversations over the phone haven’t been the same.
“It’s hard to sit there and hear him just plea, ‘Somebody get me home,'” Carter told ABC News in an interview.
Barnes, a 68-year-old father of two boys, is serving the longest prison sentence of any American who is currently being held in Russia. He was recently relocated to a penal colony hundreds of miles from Moscow.
Tuesday marks four years since Barnes was taken into custody.
His family says Barnes’ arrest came after he traveled from his apartment in The Woodlands, Texas, to Russia at the end of 2021 to try to gain visitation or custody rights to his sons through Moscow’s family court system.
Barnes’ ex-wife, Svetlana Koptyaeva, had taken their children to her native Russia following bitter divorce and child custody proceedings in Montgomery County, Texas. Upon learning of Barnes’ arrival in Russia, his family says she contacted law enforcement in Moscow and accused him of having abused the two boys.
“[She] did not want him to have access to his children, so she made the worst possible accusation that she could come up with,” Margaret Aaron, Barnes’ sister, told ABC News.
Moscow prosecutors’ case against Barnes was unlike any other involving an American jailed in Russia in recent memory, since Barnes was not accused of committing a crime on Russian soil.
Instead, Moscow prosecutors alleged that he abused his sons in suburban Houston, even though Texas law enforcement says they had no involvement in the Russian trial and previously found those allegations to not be credible after conducting their own investigation in response to Koptyaeva’s claims.
“I stand firmly by the allegations against Mr. Barnes,” Koptyaeva wrote to ABC News in an email Monday. “They are supported by my sons’ testimonies and evidence presented in both U.S. and Russian courts.”
Barnes was convicted by a judge in Moscow in 2024 and sentenced to more than 21 years in prison.
“Was it a fair trial? By no means,” Carter said.
After spending years in a detention center in the Russian capital, Barnes was recently transferred to the IK-17 penal colony, according to a spokesperson for his family. The facility previously housed other high-profile detainees like American Paul Whelan, who was freed from Russia in 2024 as part of a prisoner swap.
“We can’t speak for the other people that are in jail in Russia but we absolutely know without a doubt that David is an innocent guy that’s being held on some horrendous charges,” Carter said.
‘Nothing to justify what happened’
While Barnes already stood trial in Moscow, prosecutors more than 6,000 miles away in Texas are hoping that his ex-wife will face a different set of accusations in a courtroom 40 miles north of Houston.
The criminal case against Koptyaeva dates back nearly seven years.
From 2014 to 2019, Texas court records show that Barnes and Koptyaeva were going through an acrimonious divorce and child custody dispute.
“It gradually deteriorated,” Carter said. “He married a woman that he loved and brought two children into the world and, through forces that he didn’t understand or see, it went downhill.”
Koptyaeva raised serious accusations against Barnes during this time, accusing him of abusing their children, which he vehemently denied.
“I can say that the allegations against Mr. Barnes were investigated and evaluated by law enforcement here in Montgomery County and charges were not brought against him,” Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney Kelly Blackburn told ABC News on Monday.
The custody battle between Barnes and Koptyaeva ultimately resulted in a family law trial.
“A jury also heard evidence regarding the allegations during his custody dispute in the family law trial and even after hearing about the allegations, still awarded Mr. Barnes custody of his two children,” Blackburn said. “And that is when his ex-wife fled with them to Russia.”
The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office alleged that despite a judgment giving Barnes partial custody of their children, Koptyaeva “failed to comply with any condition for travel outside of the United States with the children,” and left the country with the boys on a Turkish Airlines flight from Houston to Istanbul on March 26, 2019.
Interpol published yellow global police notices containing pictures of the children and Koptyaeva was subsequently charged with interference with child custody, a felony crime in Texas.
A warrant for Koptyaeva’s arrest in connection with this charge is still active, according to Blackburn.
“I am not planning to return to the United States,” Koptyaeva told ABC News. “However, if I were to do so, I would plead not guilty, as I did nothing wrong. My actions were solely to protect my children from severe abuse, something any parent would do in my situation.”
A Texas court subsequently designated Barnes as the primary guardian of the children, but since the boys were believed to have ultimately ended up in Russia with Koptyaeva, he was unable to have a relationship with them.
Barnes’ friends and family maintain that Barnes’ desire to legally reunite with his children is what prompted him to travel to Moscow after COVID-19 restrictions were lifted. Instead, he ended up in a series of Russian detention centers.
“There’s nothing to justify what happened,” Carter said.
New Year, new hope?
As Barnes begins his fifth year of detention in Russia, for the first time he is being held in a penal colony a long distance away from Moscow
“From what we understand, the climate is quite a bit different,” Carter said, explaining that while Barnes was often housed in a cell with 14 to 17 other people in Moscow, he has more room to walk around in his new facility.
Carter said that the penal colony is a labor camp of sorts, but Barnes’ labor has largely been restricted to shoveling show. He is worried about his friend’s medical condition though, noting that Barnes has lost around 10 teeth since he has been in custody.
Koptyaeva has maintained that Barnes was justifiably charged and convicted, while Barnes’ relatives and acquaintances have been advocating for the U.S. government to declare that Russia is wrongfully detaining Barnes.
“We commend all efforts to secure Mr. Barnes’ release,” Rep. Dan Crenshaw, Rep. Dale Strong and Sen. John Cornyn wrote in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio in November. “As the Administration continues negotiations with Russia, we urge you to utilize every tool available to facilitate his return to the United States.”
Blackburn, the Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney, said he is not in a position at this time to say whether Barnes’ detention in Russia is wrongful, noting, “I don’t know what evidence was presented during the trial or anything else about how the proceeding[s] [were] conducted.”
The State Department has not answered ABC News’ questions over whether it considers Barnes’ detention to be wrongful.
“The Department of State has no higher priority than the safety and welfare of American citizens,” the agency said in a statement to ABC News. “U.S. Embassy officials continue to provide consular assistance to Mr. Barnes.”
Carter said that there has been increased advocacy against Barnes’ detention recently and that he is hopeful that the Trump administration will be able to bring his friend home — but fears Barnes being devastated if he is left out of another prisoner exchange.
“He’s been in some insufferable conditions and it doesn’t need to continue,” his friend said.
ABC News’ Tanya Stukalova contributed to this report.
A Utah man was found dead after being caught in an avalanche Sunday afternoon in Lincoln County, Wyoming, authorities said. (Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office)
(LINCOLN COUNTY, Wyo) — A Utah man was found dead after being caught in an avalanche Sunday afternoon in Lincoln County, Wyoming, authorities said.
Nicholas Bringhurst, 31, was snowmobiling in the LaBarge Creek area when he was caught in an avalanche that buried him in snow, according to the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office.
The sheriff’s office received a notification from a satellite device reporting an injured person, and Air Idaho was contacted and responded to the area.
“Bringhurst’s friend located and unburied him and initiated CPR,” authorities said. “However, Bringhurst died as a result of being caught in the avalanche.”
Lincoln County Coroner Dain Schwab said the coroner’s office will investigate and determine the cause of death.
“The Sheriff’s Office expresses our deepest sympathies to the Bringhurst family,” officials said.
ABC News’ Tristan Maglunog contributed to this report.
Barry Morphew is shown in this booking photo released by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office. Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office
(ALAMOSA COUNTY, Colo.) — Barry Morphew has pleaded not guilty for the second time in the alleged murder of his wife, Suzanne Morphew, whose body was found more than three years after the mother of two was reported missing.
The plea was entered on his behalf during his arraignment in Alamosa County, Colorado on Monday.
His trial has been scheduled to start on Oct. 13. He waived his right to a speedy trial, due to the amount of data and anticipated length of the proceedings. The trial is expected to last up to six weeks.
Suzanne Morphew was reported missing on Mother’s Day in May 2020. Her remains were found in September 2023 while investigators were searching in an unrelated case. Her death was subsequently ruled a homicide.
A grand jury returned an indictment against Barry Morphew on a single count of first-degree murder in June 2025. He was taken into custody in Arizona.
He had previously been charged with his wife’s presumed murder in 2021, but those charges were dropped in April 2022, just before the trial was supposed to begin.
Barry Morphew was the last known person to see his wife alive, according to the probable cause statement in the indictment.
The day she was reported missing, he told police she had planned to go on a bike ride while he was out of town on a work trip, according to the indictment. Her bike and helmet were later located in separate locations near the home.
In early interviews with law enforcement following his wife’s disappearance, Barry Morphew allegedly said their marriage was “the best,” according to the indictment. Though his statements were “inconsistent with other witness accounts and evidence located,” the indictment stated, noting that Suzanne Morphew had “confided in people that she was unhappy in the marriage in the weeks and months leading to her disappearance” and had discussed plans to divorce her husband with a close friend.
Investigators also uncovered a screenshot of a text message from Suzanne Morphew on her husband’s phone that stated, according to the indictment: “I’m done. I could care less what you’re up to and have been for years. We just need to figure this out civilly.” The screenshot was saved on May 6, 2020 — four days before she was reported missing by a neighbor, according to the indictment.
Suzanne Morphew’s body was found in September 2023 near the town of Moffat, less than an hour south of where she lived, according to the indictment.
Her death was determined to have been caused by homicide “by undetermined means in the setting of butorphanol, azaperone, and medetomidine intoxication,” according to the autopsy.
Law enforcement specifically requested that the coroner’s office test for the presence of butorphanol, azaperone and medetomidine, which comprise a chemical mixture known as BAM that is used for sedating animals, according to the indictment.
Prior to moving to Colorado in 2018, Barry Morphew was a deer farmer in Indiana and used BAM to sedate and transport deer on his farm, according to the indictment. He allegedly admitted to using BAM in Colorado as recently as April 2020 to tranquilize a deer on his property, according to the indictment.
According to the indictment, records of BAM prescriptions showed that Barry Morphew last purchased BAM by prescription in March 2018, and that no individual or business in the Colorado region where the Morphews lived and where Suzanne Morphew’s remains were found had purchased BAM prescriptions from 2017 to 2020.
“Ultimately, the prescription records show that when Suzanne Morphew disappeared, only one private citizen living in that entire area of the state had access to BAM: Barry Morphew,” the indictment stated.
Barry Morphew has denied any involvement in his wife’s death.
“Yet again, the government allows their predetermined conclusion to lead their search for evidence,” his attorney, David Beller, said in a statement to ABC News last year following his indictment. “Barry maintains his innocence. The case has not changed and the outcome will not either.”
His attorney during his initial prosecution by the 11th Judicial District Attorney’s Office also maintained her former client’s innocence.
“Not only is he a loving father, but he was a loving husband,” the attorney, Iris Eytan said in a statement. “I’ve handled thousands of cases, and I’ve never seen prosecutors mishandle a case so recklessly.”
The district attorney for the 11th Judicial District at the time, Linda Stanley, was disbarred by the Colorado Supreme Court in 2024 for misconduct regarding the Morphew case and others.
Barry Morphew and his daughters spoke to ABC News in May 2023 after they filed a lawsuit against prosecutors, saying he was wrongfully charged.
“They’ve got tunnel vision and they looked at one person and they’ve got too much pride to say they’re wrong and look somewhere else,” he said at the time. “I don’t have anything to worry about. I’ve done nothing wrong.”
According to an FBI affidavit, the building sustained “extensive” damage, rendering it “inoperable for an indefinite period of time.”
The suspect, identified by the FBI as Stephen Spencer Pittman, allegedly laughed about the attack, telling his father “he finally got them” and referring to the place of worship as the “synagogue of Satan,” according to the affidavit.
Pittman is charged with arson of property used in interstate commerce or used in an activity affecting interstate commerce, according to the criminal complaint.
The fire occurred around 3 a.m. on Saturday at the historic Beth Israel Congregation temple in Jackson, the same synagogue that was bombed in 1967 by the Ku Klux Klan, officials said. The FBI said the building also houses the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life (ISJL).
“The ISJL operates in interstate and foreign commerce as it provides services to Jewish communities” in 13 different states, including Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas, according to the affidavit, and also “provides comprehensive religious school programs to 70 Jewish congregations and offers traveling rabbinical services,” most of which “are delivered in states outside the State of Mississippi.”
Pittman’s father contacted the FBI and “advised his son confessed to setting the building on fire,” according to the affidavit, and allegedly sent text messages to his father about the blaze, saying he was “due for a homerun” and “I did my research,” according to the affidavit.
Pittman allegedly admitted to stopping to purchase gasoline, taking his license plate off of his car, breaking a window at the synagogue, pouring the gasoline inside of the building and using a torch lighter to start the fire, according to the affidavit.
“Pittman was identified as a person of interest and ultimately confessed to lighting a fire inside the building due to the building’s Jewish ties,” according to the affidavit.
Security video from inside the building “showed the fire was started by an individual inside the building in the early morning hours of January 10, 2026,” according to the affidavit.
“A hooded individual can be seen walking in the interior of the building pouring contents from what appeared to be a gas container,” the affidavit also said.
A memorial dedicated to the 19 children and two adults murdered on May 24, 2022, during a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School is seen on January 6, 2026, in Uvalde, Texas. Brandon Bell/Getty Images
(UVALDE, Texas) — An attorney for former Uvalde, Texas, school police officer Adrian Gonzales brought a neon orange foam handgun to court on Monday as he tried to defend the police response to the Robb Elementary School mass shooting.
After stepping behind an eight-foot foam board, defense attorney Nico LaHood began his cross examination by asking the witness, a ranger with the Texas Department of Public Safety, “I’m going to point this — do you mind if I point this at you?”
LaHood proceeded to peek his fake weapon out of the foam board while asking the witness, Scott Swick, about the appropriate police response to a mass shooting.
“As a law enforcement officer, you should never rush into a situation without assessing it?” LaHood asked.
“To a point,” Swick said.
Prosecutors allege Gonzales, who is charged with child endangerment, did not follow his training and endangered the 19 students who died and an additional 10 surviving students. Gonzales has pleaded not guilty and his lawyers argue he is being unfairly blamed for a broader law-enforcement failure that day. It took 77 minutes before law enforcement mounted a counterassault to end the May 2022 rampage.
Another witness on Monday was Texas Ranger Terry Snyder, who testified about the shell casings recovered from the hallway of Robb Elementary.
During cross examination, defense attorney Gary Hillier tried to use the testimony to highlight the risk potentially faced by Gonzales.
“Because we’ve seen evidence here that rounds have been fired in this hallway, so anyone who enters through that doorway is entering a potentially life or death situation for them personally?” Hillier asked.
“Correct,” Snyder said.
Prosecutors attempted to recover from the cross examinations by highlighting the urgency of the police response to a mass shooting.
“So, when an officer hears shooting but can’t see shooting, what does the officer do?” prosecutor Bill Turner said.
“Runs to the shooting, where we tactically approach to where the shooting has occurred,” Snyder said.
Monday’s testimony was much more technical than last week’s, when the prosecution’s witnesses included educators who survived the massacre. Teacher Lynn Deming testified that she used her body to protect her fourth-grade students from gunfire and tried to keep them calm.
“I just kept saying, you know, like, ‘Babies, I love you. Just pray, I love you, OK,'” she testified as she held back tears. “I just wanted the last thing they heard was that somebody loved them. So, I think I said it a million times.”
Friday also brought the first testimony from a parent of a victim. Jennifer Garcia, whose 9-year-old daughter Eliahna Amyah Garcia was killed, told jurors, “We couldn’t find her. Kids were just running everywhere.”
According to former acting Dallas District Attorney Messina Madson, prosecutors appeared to be using their first witnesses to lay bare the tragedy that took place before turning their focus to Gonzales specifically.
“This is an unusual way to apply this law, and so from an overall point of view of what the district attorney’s office is trying to do is say this is a tragedy,” Madson, now a criminal defense attorney at MC Criminal Law, told ABC News. “This is a terrible, horrible thing that happened, and it is so horrible that not only do we have to mourn it, but somebody is criminally responsible, besides the person who pulled the trigger.”
According to Madson, prosecutors will need to clearly identify what opportunities Gonzales had to intervene and how close he was to the shooter to prove he “intentionally, knowingly, recklessly and with criminal negligence” placed students in harm’s way.
“It’s saying that somebody in those circumstances would have understood the risk and would have intervened and … you behaved in a way that was not how a reasonable person would in that situation,” Madson said.
ABC News’ Juan Renteria contributed to this report.
Lonnie G. Bunch III, 14th Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, speaks onstage during the John and Lillian Miles Lewis Foundation 2025 Good Trouble Gala, May 29, 2025, in Atlanta. Paras Griffin/Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — The Smithsonian Institution is facing a deadline to submit additional materials to the White House related to a review demanded by the Trump administration of the institution’s exhibitions, programming and internal governance.
According to a Dec. 18, 2025, letter from the White House addressed to Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie Bunch III, the Smithsonian Institution’s previous submission last fall “fell far short of what was requested, and the overwhelming majority of requested items remain outstanding.”
It is unclear which materials were submitted in September and which materials “remain outstanding.”
ABC News has reached out to the White House for comment. The Smithsonian declined to comment about the deadline.
The request for materials comes after the White House said in a letter addressed to Bunch last August that it plans to conduct a wide-ranging review of the Smithsonian’s museum exhibitions, materials and operations to ensure they align with President Donald Trump’s view of American history.
In response to the White House’s demand, Bunch said the institution would be conducting the review internally, a Smithsonian official confirmed to ABC News.
Following the internal review, a Smithsonian official said Bunch will brief the White House on its findings, but a formal report will not be sent to the White House, the Smithsonian official added.
A White House official told ABC News in September that the Smithsonian “cannot credibly audit itself.”
“The Smithsonian is not an autonomous institution, as 70% of its funding comes from taxpayers. While we acknowledge the Smithsonian’s recognition of its own programmatic failures and is moving toward critical introspection, it cannot credibly audit itself,” White House official Lindsey Halligan said. “By definition, an ‘audit’ must be neutral and objective. The American taxpayers deserve nothing less, which is why the White House will ensure the audit is conducted impartially. This is non-negotiable.”
The president signed an executive order on March 27, placing Vice President JD Vance in charge of supervising efforts to “remove improper ideology” from all areas of the Smithsonian and targeted funding for programs that advance “divisive narratives” and “improper ideology.”
The order — called “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History” — directed Vance and Interior Department Secretary Doug Burgum to restore federal parks, monuments, memorials and statues “that have been improperly removed or changed in the last five years to perpetuate a false revision of history or improperly minimize or disparage certain historical figures or events.”
Bunch, who met with Trump at the White House on Aug. 28, referenced his conversations with Trump in a Sept. 3 letter to the institution’s employees, which was obtained by ABC News.
In the letter, Bunch told employees he underscored the independence of the Smithsonian, saying it was “paramount.” He also told employees that the institution remains committed to telling the “American story” and “will always be, a place that welcomes all Americans and the world.”
ABC News’ John Santucci, Hannah Demissie, Laura Romero and Michelle Stoddart contributed to this report.
Spencer and Monique Tepe are seen in this undated photo. (Courtesy Rob Misleh)
(COLUMBUS, Ohio) — A Chicago man accused of gunning down his ex-wife and her husband in their home has waived extradition and will be transferred from Illinois to Ohio to face charges.
Michael McKee is charged with premeditated aggravated murder for allegedly shooting and killing his ex-wife, Monique Tepe, and her husband, dentist Spencer Tepe, at their Columbus home on Dec. 30, according to police.
McKee, 39, wore a yellow jumpsuit as he made a brief first court appearance on Monday in Rockford, Illinois, where he was arrested on Saturday.
McKee did not enter a plea but assistant public defender Carie Poirier told the judge he intended to plead not guilty. A status hearing on his transfer to Ohio is scheduled for Jan. 19.
Police announced McKee’s arrest on Saturday after he was linked to a car seen on surveillance footage in the neighborhood, according to court documents.
McKee and Monique Tepe were married in 2015 and divorced in 2017, according to divorce records obtained by ABC Columbus affiliate WSYX. They did not have any children together, according to the records.
Spencer and Monique Tepe married in December 2020, according to their obituary.
They are survived by their two young children who were found safe inside the house after the Dec. 30 killings.
McKee’s arrest came one day before the scheduled celebration of life service for the couple.
“Today’s arrest represents an important step toward justice for Monique and Spencer,” the family said in a statement on Saturday. “Nothing can undo the devastating loss of two lives taken far too soon, but we are grateful to the City of Columbus Police Department, its investigators, and assisting law enforcement community. … As the case proceeds, we trust the justice system to hold the person responsible fully accountable.”
“Monique and Spencer remain at the center of our hearts, and we carry forward their love as we surround and protect the two children they leave behind,” the family said. “We will continue to honor their lives and the light they brought into this world.”
ABC News’ Matt Foster, Victoria Arancio and Nadine El-Bawab contributed to this report.
