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Meghan Markle lambasted over surprise appearance at Robb Elementary School
Recently-released pictures show Meghan Markle laying flowers near where Salvador Ramos went on a shooting rampage in Texas.
Meghan Markle places flowers as she mourns at a makeshift memorial outside Uvalde County Courthouse in Uvalde, Texas, on May 26, 2022 | Photo by CHANDAN KHANNA / AFP
As tributes continue to pour in for the lives taken in the devastating Robb Elementary School shooting, the Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle, has visited Uvalde.
In recently-released pictures, the royal is seen laying flowers outside the town’s County Courthouse, near where Salvador Ramos went on a shooting rampage.
Ramos is the teenage gunman who killed at least 19 young children and two adults at an elementary school in Texas on Tuesday, prompting a furious President Joe Biden to denounce the US gun lobby and vow to end the nation’s cycle of mass shootings.
The attack in Uvalde — a small community about an hour from the Mexican border — was the deadliest US school shooting in years, and the latest in a spree of bloody gun violence across America.
“It’s time to turn this pain into action for every parent, for every citizen of this country,” Biden said, his voice heavy with emotion.
“It’s time for those who obstruct or delay or block commonsense gun laws — we need to let you know that we will not forget,” he said.
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“As a nation, we have to ask when in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby? When in God’s name will we do what we all know in our gut needs to be done?”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott, addressing an earlier news conference, named the suspect as Salvador Ramos, an 18-year-old local resident and a US citizen.
“He shot and killed, horrifically and incomprehensibly,” Abbott said.
Texas Department of Public Safety officials told CNN the gunman is believed to have shot his grandmother before heading to Robb Elementary School around noon where he abandoned his vehicle and entered with a handgun and a rifle, wearing body armour.
The gunman was killed by responding officers, the officials said, adding later two adults also died in the attack.
Wearing Diana’s Cartier watch, Meghan Markle paid her respects alongside crosses left in memory of the massacre victims.
She has, however, come under fire for staging the appearance for publicity with her detractors taking to social media to express their disgust.
Meghan Markle’s supporters came out in their numbers to defend her ongoing philanthropic efforts, labelling the need to dissect everything Meghan does “racist”.
Her public appearance comes just days after her father, Thomas Markle, suffered a stroke.
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Additional reporting by AFP
