WORSE & WORSE

Slain Uvalde Teacher’s Cop Husband Was Detained as He Tried to Rescue Her

Ruben Ruiz, an officer with the Uvalde school police department, also reportedly had his gun taken away from him by fellow officers.

A Uvalde school district police officer married to a teacher killed in the Uvalde school shooting last month was detained and had his gun taken away from him as he attempted to reach her, according to a top official. Speaking to the Texas Senate, the state’s Department of Public Safety director Steve McCraw said Ruben Ruiz had known his wife, Eva Mireles, had been injured by the gunman but that he was forcibly moved away from the classroom in which she was trapped. “We got an officer whose wife called him and said she’d been shot and she’s dying,” McCraw said. “He tried to move forward into the hallway. He was detained, and they took his gun away from him and escorted him off the scene.” The director did not specify which agency was responsible for detaining Ruiz. Mireles, a fourth-grade teacher, was one of two teachers killed by the shooter, along with 19 students. McCraw also said on Tuesday that the classroom door had not been locked, as the embattled Uvalde school district police chief had previously maintained, and that officers could have neutralized the gunman in three minutes had they chosen to breach the door.