Adrian Gonzales, the former Uvalde school police officer who was found not guilty for his role in the 2022 mass shooting, said it’s been a “struggle” for him because he had to leave the town he was born and raised in after the shooting. “I understand what the families are going through,” Gonzales told WFAA in an interview Thursday night after the verdict was read. “It’s hard. If I tell them anything, I know it’s not gonna make them feel any better, but this is a struggle for me, for my family, to get up and leave. It’s hard.”During the trial against Gonzales, who was one of the first police officers on scene the day of the 2022 mass shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers, prosecution argued that Gonzales did not follow his active shooter training. His defense, however, argued that Gonzales had “tunnel vision” when looking for the shooter and originally misidentified a teacher’s aide as the threat, but once he knew where the shooter was, Gonzales ran toward danger.“I did the best that I could with the information that I was getting,” Gonzales told WFAA. “And if you’ve never been in a situation like that, you can sit here and tell me all you want about what I would have done or what you would have done. Until you’re in that mix, you can’t tell me anything different.”After the verdict, the families of the victims expressed their frustration. Jazmin Cazares, whose 9-year-old sister Jackie Cazares was killed in the mass shooting, shared a letter she wrote to Gonzales on Instagram, calling him a “failure.”“I imagine [Jackie’s] fear as she watches her friends die,” Jazmin Cazares writes. “I imagine her confusion, wondering why this is happening. I imagine her anticipation, wondering if her killer is coming back, is she next? I imagine her pain, a hole burning through her chest and a bullet ripping through her heart, the burning and pressure spreading through her body, making every breath harder than the last. I imagine her hearing the sound of people talking in the hallway and the desperation she must have felt as she waited for them to break down the door.”Former Uvalde school district police officer Adrian Gonzales (left) reacts as he stands beside his attorney, Nico LaHood, to answer reporters' questions after the jury found Gonzales not guilty on Jan. 21, 2026, in Corpus Christi, Texas. Sam Owens/The San Antonio Express-News via Associated PressBrett Cross, whose 10-year-son Uziyah Garcia was killed in the shooting, said the verdict was “to be expected.”“Those jurors represented Texas, and what Texas just told everyone is our kids don’t matter,” Cross said in a TikTok posted Thursday. “What Texas just told everyone is that your kids don’t matter. That they will always choose the cop over children.”Gonzales told WFAA that he lived in Uvalde for 50 years, where he worked as a teacher, coach and police officer. He said working with kids was a “passion” for him, but now, it’s been a “struggle” for him.Nico LaHood, one of Gonzales’ defense attorneys, who was sitting beside him during the interview said, “You’re praying for them still.”“I’m still praying for them,” Gonzales said. “Every day when I go to work, I pray for them and their families, and not just them but the community.”He added that he can “never go home” again.LaHood then chimed in: “We can’t ignore the fact that there are some families that their children are never going to go home either. So there’s pain to go around, and that’s why I said the community needs to heal.”Pete Arredondo, the former police chief for Uvalde school police, has also been charged with child endangerment for his role in the mass shooting response. He has pleaded not guilty, and his trial date has yet to be set.