Grandfather of Robb Elementary Shooting Suspect Says He Did Not Know Suspect Had Guns

Published: 5/25/2022, 11:53:25 PM EDT

Grandfather of Robb Elementary Shooting Suspect Says He Did Not Know Suspect Had Guns — Rolando Reyes, the grandfather of Robb Elementary School shooting suspect Salvador Ramos, speaks to reporters in Uvalde, Texas, on May 25, 2022. (CNN/Screenshot via NTD)

The grandfather of Robb Elementary suspect Salvador Ramos said he was not aware Ramos possessed the assault rifles used in the shooting.

“I didn’t know he had weapons,” Rolando Reyes, grandfather of Ramos, told ABC News in a May 25 interview. “I would have reported it.”

Officials said Ramos legally purchased two assault rifles at a local gun store earlier in the month, which he used to kill 19 students and two teachers in Robb Elementary School on May 24. He was killed by a Border Patrol agent who responded to the incident.

The conversation between the ABC reporter and the grandfather revealed that the grandfather had a previous conviction that made it illegal for him to be around guns.

“I cannot be around guns,” the grandfather said.

“I hate when I see all the news … All those people that get shot. I’m against all that,” he said.

In regards to the Robb Elementary shooting, Reyes told a CCN reporter: “I’m very sorry. … I feel a lot of pain for all of them because a lot of the kids are my friends’ grandchildren. And I’m sorry. I'm sorry to all the families.”

He also said that Ramos’s grandmother, Celia Martinez Gonzales, whom Ramos shot in the head, took him to dinner at Applebee's to celebrate his 18th birthday about a week prior, on May 16.

In a separate interview with the New York Post, Reyes said the suspect stormed out following a dispute with Martinez Gonzales at their home on Diaz Street.

The 66-year-old grandmother “lost a lot of blood,” Reyes said, adding that she is currently in a hospital in San Antonio and was conscious on the morning of May 25. An internet search yielded no criminal records from Ramos.