Robb Elementary victim didn’t want to go to school on day of mass shooting: report
A fourth grader who was killed in the Robb Elementary School mass shooting pleaded with her mother to stay home that morning, according to a report.
Jailah Silguero wanted to “stay home with momma,” but with two days left to the school year, her mother told her to go, a relative told The Daily Beast.
“Jailah didn’t want to go to school yesterday,” her grandmother Linda Gonzales told the outlet. “That’s what her momma was really upset about last night: ‘If only I had let her stay home.’”
Jailah’s mother, Veronica Luevanos, is one of scores of parents in Uvalde, Texas mourning the death of their child after 18-year-old Salvador Ramos entered the school and allegedly started shooting at “whoever’s in his way.” Overall, 21 people were killed.
The girl’s cousin, Jayce Carmelo Luevanos, was also among the 19 children killed.
The rest of the school year was canceled Tuesday.
Gonzales described Jailah and Jayce as the babies of the family; Jailah loved to dance and Jayce loved to make people laugh.
“They were just so sweet,” she told The Daily Beast. “They were sweet kids and lovable. What can you say about little innocent kids?”
The two cousins had already dealt with a family tragedy the week before when a memorial was held for Veronica’s father who recently died, Gonzales said.
“He was in Mexico so they didn’t get to see him,” Gonzales said. “I told Veronica last night, ‘Just look at it as your daddy taking your baby with him.’”
Gonzales told the outlet Veronica frantically traveled back and forth between the school and the city’s civics center where parents were being reunited with their children. Veronica spent hours waiting.
“They didn’t realize there were dead children in the school,” Gonzales reportedly said. “They kept telling them: go to [the] hospital or go to the civic center. Nobody was told there’s dead kids in there. Nobody.”
Veronica posted on Facebook that her daughter “didn’t deserve this.”
“Neither did your classmates n cousin Jayce nor your 2 teacher’s. I’m so heart broken baby,” she wrote. “We miss you so much mama R.I.P my beautiful angel fly high baby can’t wait to see u again. We Love You Jailah &Jayce fly high my loves.”
Zeke Luevanos, an uncle to Jailah and Jayce, drove from Odessa to help his sister and brother, who both had submitted DNA samples while searching for their kids, according to the Los Angeles Times.
“They’re not doing too good,” he told the outlet before the cousins were named among the victims. “This is a good town, a really good town. It’s just a waiting game.”
Gonzales, the grandmother, told The Daily Beast one her nephews, an official with the local sheriff’s department, responded to the gruesome scene and left drenched in blood from the carnage.
“He picked up some children to lay them in someplace so they could be covered,” Gonzales told the outlet. “He’ll never forget the scene.”
Gonzales couldn’t believe Ramos, 18, was able to purchase such a lethal weapon.
“How can they allow an 18-year-old to purchase a weapon when they don’t allow them to buy alcohol or liquor?” she told The Daily Beast. “They can’t buy liquor or cigarettes but they can buy a weapon. We don’t know what to think.”
