On the afternoon of April 22, 2024, parents were arriving at William Wiley Elementary School in West Richland, Washington to collect their children at the end of the day. At 3:23 p.m., police were called to reports of shots fired in the parking lot. Officers found Amber Rodriguez, 31, a paraeducator at the school, with gunshot wounds. She died at the scene. The Benton County Coroner's Office later determined she died of multiple gunshot wounds. Within minutes, the name of the suspect went out over the radio: Elias Huizar, 39, her ex-husband, and a former school resource officer with the Yakima Police Department. This video is the West Richland Police Department body-worn camera from that afternoon and evening - the first officers arriving, the school being cleared room by room and the children counted, the witnesses in the parking lot describing the truck he left in, and the search that spread across two states. Hours later, officers went to Huizar's home a short distance away. Inside they found a second body: Angelica Santos, 17. The Benton County Coroner's Office determined she died of multiple stab wounds. Her one-year-old son was missing, and an AMBER Alert was issued. The following afternoon, Oregon State Police pursued a vehicle on Interstate 5 near Eugene, Oregon. Authorities said gunfire was exchanged and the vehicle eventually crashed. Elias Huizar died of what authorities described as a self-inflicted gunshot wound. The one-year-old was found in the vehicle unharmed and taken into protective custody. The AMBER Alert was cancelled. WHAT THE FOOTAGE DOES NOT SHOW - and what the record says: Elias Huizar was free on bail when he arrived at that school. On February 8, 2024 - ten weeks earlier - he had been arrested and charged with rape in the second degree and rape of a child in the third degree. Angelica Santos was the alleged victim in the child rape count. A judge set bail at $250,000, and he posted it. Benton County Prosecutor Eric Eisinger later said the amount reflected Huizar's lack of criminal history and his ties to the community, and said that if the office could have anticipated what happened, it would have asked for more. Huizar had met Santos years earlier, while he was the school resource officer assigned to her middle school in Yakima and she was in the sixth grade. The Washington Attorney General's Office investigated the relationship in 2019 and found insufficient corroboration to charge. Yakima's police chief later said he had intended to discipline Huizar for failing to report the allegation himself, as a mandatory reporter, but the contractual deadline passed before he did. Huizar resigned from the Yakima Police Department on February 14, 2022, and was hired that same year as a substitute teacher by the Richland School District. Amber Rodriguez had a Domestic Violence Protection Order against him. She first applied on February 7, 2024 and was turned down for insufficient information. She applied again and it was granted on February 9. On April 17 - five days before she was killed - she filed a written declaration with the court that said she believed he would try to harm her and her children. In late 2024, attorneys for Rodriguez's estate and her two surviving sons filed notices of claim seeking $50 million each, $150 million in total, against the Richland School District, the Yakima School District, the City of Yakima and the Yakima Police Department, and the West Richland Police Department, alleging failures in his hiring, his supervision and the handling of his firearms. The claims are a required step before a lawsuit. No court has ruled on them. Elias Huizar was never tried. He died roughly thirty hours after the shooting, and the charges against him were never tested. Footage in this video: West Richland Police Department Axon body-worn camera and school and neighbourhood surveillance video, released as public records under case 24-003977. Some faces are blurred by the agency at source. Court and background information from The Columbian, KGW, KEPR, KHQ, NBC Right Now, Apple Valley News Now, OPB, NBC News, CNN and the Benton County Coroner's Office.

bodycam bodycam footage body cam police bodycam body worn camera axon true crime West Richland Richland Tri-Cities Benton County Washington state Yakima Elias Huizar Amber Rodriguez school resource officer former police officer ex cop amber alert double homicide domestic violence manhunt Oregon State Police Interstate 5 Eugene Oregon police response crime scene police footage real crime bodycam justice public records