This article is a real heart-wrencher, folks. I almost spilled my coffee reading about the two deadliest child tragedies in the US this decade, and how Texas has turned to the same two investigators to determine what went wrong. Casey Garrett and Michael Massengale were tasked with untangling the mistakes and confusion surrounding the law enforcement response to the Uvalde school massacre, where a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers. And then, they were asked to do the same for the Camp Mystic tragedy, where 27 children died in a flash flood. Bless their hearts, these investigators have seen some terrible things.
The Uvalde massacre was a painful investigation, and Garrett described it as a “deeply painful event.” The state legislature wanted answers quickly, so Garrett and Massengale spent weeks poring over video evidence and police calls, interviewing people to produce their assessment of what happened. Their conclusion was that an “overall lackadaisical approach” failed to stop the killing. You can’t make this stuff up, folks. It’s just tragic.
But they thought they were finished. Oh no, not quite. The Camp Mystic tragedy happened, and they were called in again. “God forbid,” Garrett said. “You’re not going to predict another casualty that has your skill set in mind.” The two investigators did not know each other when the state asked them to investigate the Uvalde massacre, but they soon made a strength of their differences. Massengale said that while Garrett was in Uvalde, interviewing people and surfacing information, he spent a lot of time analyzing data, trying to document it and tell a story to help people understand what had happened.
The investigators noticed common themes between what happened in Uvalde and at Camp Mystic, despite the outward differences. “It’s a hazard that is known, has been studied, people train to prepare for them: active shooter, flood,” Massengale said. But in both cases, there was alert fatigue, he added. Garrett said that the lack of preparation flows a little bit from “That won’t happen here.” Somewhere in Atlanta, a producer thought this sounded terrifying, and I have to agree. The issues go far beyond a school and a camp in Texas, according to Garrett.
In the end, Texas passed school-safety laws in the wake of the Uvalde report, and the state introduced camp-safety laws just weeks after the July 4 disaster. Camp Mystic had hoped to reopen this summer but withdrew its application in late April. It filed for bankruptcy reorganization in June. Garrett said she would grieve this July 4 for the victims and the missed opportunities. “It literally takes the breath out of your lungs to think about how truly avoidable this was.” It’s a sobering thought, folks.
As I finish reading this article, I’m left with a sense of sadness and frustration. Two tragedies, two investigations, and still, we’re left wondering how these things could have happened. But hey, at least we have Garrett and Massengale, the yin and yang investigators, working to make sense of it all. And who knows, maybe their work will help prevent similar tragedies in the future. A guy can hope, right?
Armchair patriot. Believes in the free market, cold beer, and that there’s always a guy named George behind every CNN segment.
Former remote-throwing champion turned #1 couch commentator on liberal panic in the media. Born in Texas (or so his mug says), he earned a degree in Fake Newsology & Beer Philosophy from YouTube University.
