A near-total breakdown in policing protocols hindered the response to the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, in 2022 that left 21 people dead, the Justice Department concluded today after a nearly two-year investigation.

“Lives would have been saved, and people could have survived” if officers had not refused to rapidly confront the killer, Attorney General Merrick Garland said.

The department blamed “cascading failures of leadership, decision-making, tactics, policy and training” for a passive law enforcement response that allowed an 18-year-old gunman to remain inside Robb Elementary School for more than an hour before he was confronted and killed. (Here’s a minute-by-minute timeline of the 78-minute ordeal.)

The most significant failure, investigators concluded, was the decision by local police officials to classify the incident as a barricaded standoff rather than an “active-shooter” scenario, which would have demanded instant and aggressive action. Most of the officials in charge that day have been fired or have retired.

The nearly 600-page report, compiled from 260 interviews and 14,000 documents and videos, is the most comprehensive assessment to date of a killing spree that continues to haunt Uvalde. Vanita Gupta, a top Justice Department official who oversaw the investigation, said the shooting caused “a loss of faith and trust” in law enforcement. “It was an unimaginable failure,” she added.

Fighting has eased in northern Gaza

Israel has dialed back its military campaign in the northern Gaza Strip, where Israeli officials say their military succeeded in degrading Hamas’s local battalions. Airstrikes are no longer as common and many Israeli troops have pulled out of the area. Residents there have said they can now walk around without the sounds of guns or explosions.

Northern Gaza is largely in ruins, with entire neighborhoods rendered unrecognizable and displaced Palestinians squatting in abandoned homes. Food is scarce and few aid shipments are reaching the north. Makeshift markets have popped up with vendors selling what many residents presume are stolen goods.

Trump prosecutor in Georgia tries to quash a subpoena

Fani Willis, the district attorney in Georgia prosecuting a criminal case against Donald Trump, is trying to quash a subpoena seeking her testimony in the divorce proceedings of a prosecutor she hired to manage the case. Last week, she was accused of having an improper romantic relationship with the prosecutor, Nathan Wade.

In a legal filing today, Willis said there was no reason for her to testify because both Wade and his wife had declared their marriage to be “irretrievably broken.” Willis also accused Wade’s wife of conspiring with one of Trump’s co-defendants “to annoy, embarrass and oppress” her.

Separately, my colleague Richard Fausset obtained emails in which Willis and another member of her team suggested that some of Trump’s lawyers were disrespecting them because they are Black. “In the legal community (and the world at large),” Willis wrote, “some people will never be able to respect African Americans.”

Chinese scientists sent Covid’s code to the U.S. in late 2019

Chinese scientists sent eight pages of the coronavirus’s genetic code to a U.S. data repository on Dec. 28, 2019, according to new documents released by House Republicans. That was two days before Chinese officials warned of an unexplained pneumonia sickening patients in Wuhan.

With the importance of the code not yet clear, the U.S. never published the submission and instead asked for more details. It took two more weeks until other scientists put the code online, setting off a frantic effort to build tests and vaccines. That delay reinforced questions about when China learned of the virus that was causing its unexplained outbreak — and about gaps in the American system of monitoring dangerous pathogens.

Life outside the mansion

Hugh Hefner died more than six years ago, and around the same time, Crystal Hefner, his third and last wife, moved out of the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles. But she is still adjusting to life on the outside.

Next week, she will step back into the public view with a tell-all memoir titled “Only Say Good Things.” In the book, Hefner re-examines her initiation into the Playboy world, details the objectification and misogyny she said she experienced under Hefner, and mines the trauma that she’s still processing.

Don’t laugh and drive

American highways for several years have been scattered with humorous safety messages that get drivers to chuckle (or groan). In Iowa there was “Texting & Driving? Oh Cell No!” In New Jersey, drivers were warned to “Slow Down. This Ain’t Thunder Road.”

The federal government now wants to get rid of them. In the latest guidance, officials warned that attempts at humor or pop culture references can be distracting or misunderstood. But amid conflicting research, some states said they plan to keep them up.

Have a witty evening.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Matthew

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