Uvalde school police chief said he tried at least 26 keys to the room where the shooter was, but none worked

• The Uvalde schools police chief said he tried over 26 keys to access the room where the gunman was.
• None of them worked, he said, and eventually another officer found the right key.

The officer leading the police response to the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, said he tried using dozens of keys to open a barricaded door and reach the gunman, but failed because none of them worked.

Uvalde schools district police Chief Pete Arredondo told the Texas Tribune that he had called for the keys and a tool to break down the door, which he couldn't kick down because it was reinforced.

While the breaching tool never came, the keys did, per the Tribune. Arredondo said he was given a set of six keys by a janitor, and tried each one fruitlessly on the door of a room connected to where the gunman was.

Another key ring with about 20 to 30 keys was later brought to him, and he tried all of them one by one, he said, giving a total of at least 26 attempts.

"I was praying one of them was going to open up the door each time I tried a key," Arredondo told the Tribune.

The Uvalde school district's officers don't carry master keys to the schools they visit, nor does the school have a modern lock system with remote control, the Tribune reported.

His lawyer, George E. Hyde, who provided the Tribune with statements alongside the interview, said: "You're talking about a key ring that's got to weigh 10 pounds."

Eventually, Arredondo was informed that another officer had found the key to the room, he told the outlet. More than an hour passed before officers on the scene took down the gunman.

Arredondo's comments give some insight into a haphazard law enforcement response that has been widely criticized.

Having been identified by the Texas Department of Public Safety as the incident commander, Arredondo has faced the majority of the criticism.

He told the Tribune that he has been avoiding his house because it's constantly watched by reporters. Arredondo said that as a boy, he attended the same school where the massacre happened.

One of the teachers who died, Irma Garcia, was married to his second cousin, Joe Garcia, a schoolmate of Arredondo's, he told the Tribune. Joe Garcia died two days after the attack due to "a broken heart," his relatives said.

The other slain teacher was married to an officer in Arredondo's unit, per the Tribune.

The police chief said he's received death threats from strangers. "Those are people who just don't know the whole story that are making their assumptions on what they're hearing or reading. That's been difficult," he said.