Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin said he was outraged by the actions of Lt. Mariano Pargas, who a CNN report showed failed to organize help for children he knew were trapped with a gunman.   

  “Lt.  Pargas will not be a member of the Uvalde police department.  By the end of the week at the latest, if not sooner,” he told CNN on Tuesday.   

  Pargas has been on administrative leave since July, two months after a failed law enforcement response to the massacre that killed 19 fourth-grade students and two teachers.  However, CNN’s report that Pargas contacted his dispatchers to get the details of a 911 call from a student trapped in a classroom, but still didn’t take over, now gives city officials the excuse they they need to take him off the payroll, McLaughlin said.   

  He said he was grateful for the CNN report, but disappointed that information he and city leaders needed to address changes to the police force had been withheld while the local district attorney conducts her own investigation before possible criminal charges.  In June, Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell Busbee said she did want records or video released while the investigations were ongoing.  “Any release of records about this incident at this time would impede this ongoing investigation and prevent a thorough and complete investigation,” she said in a statement.   

  “As the mayor of this community and I can speak for the county judge across the street, we have not been contacted once by law enforcement,” McLaughlin said.   

  “I think Mariano would have left sooner,” he added of what would have happened if he had known what CNN revealed about Parga acting as police chief the day of the May 24 shooting while the police chief was on vacation.   

  “It just shows why we put him on leave in the first place – his failure to act and create a command situation.  And then as the acting police chief, he gets that information and he does nothing with it, what I saw.”   

  McLaughlin said city attorneys will now see if Pargas, 65, will resign or if further action is needed.   

  CNN reached out to Parga for comment after speaking with McLaughlin, but has not heard back.  On Monday, Pargas said his lawyers advised him not to speak, but he wanted to defend his actions.   

  “It is not that we are afraid because there is nothing to fear.  We did everything we could, but the thing is, they told us we can’t (speak publicly),” he said.   

  If Pargas chooses not to leave voluntarily, McLaughlin said the police chief and city manager now have justification to take action, and another path to termination could come through the city commission.   

  McLaughlin said “he should” when asked if Pargas should be fired, but added, “I don’t know if he’s going to retire.  I don’t know if he will be fired.  That will be between his lawyer and our lawyers to get this.”   

  He complained that he and city leaders were repeatedly blindsided by CNN’s investigative reporting about the response by law enforcement, local officers, and the actions of officers from the Texas Department of Public Safety.   

  The lack of information hampered decision-making, but it was also difficult for the victims’ families to whom he promised to get the truth, he said.   

  And he reiterated his concern that not everyone was open about the mistakes made that day.   

  “This smacks of an endless cover-up to me on the part of DPS, because there’s been no transparency, there’s been no honesty and so on,” he said.   

  “Every time we shoot the story changes or they release a narrative that only shows part of the story…but it always leaves DPS out.  It’s disappointing, it’s really disappointing.”   

  Col. Steven McCraw, DPS director, dismissed McLaughlin’s suspicions in September.  “First of all, there is no cover-up.  And the bottom line is, as soon as we can, we’re going to release it all,” he said when CNN caught up with him before a meeting in Brownsville, Texas.   

  McLaughlin said he stood outside the school that day when it took 77 minutes for officers to stop a gunman after he entered the building and common sense told him there were children inside.   

  “It’s time to come clean,” he said.   

  “Mistakes were made that day.  There is no question about it.  Horrible mistakes.  But we have to come forward and fix it so that this same mistake doesn’t happen to another school or another community that maybe they can learn from what happened here.”