Uvalde elementary school principal moving to district administrative post
The development comes after Mandy Gutierrez was briefly suspended.
The principal of Robb Elementary School, who was briefly suspended before being reinstated last month, will be leaving the school for a position in district administration, the school district announced.
Mandy Gutierrez has accepted a position as assistant director of special education, Hal Harrell, the superintendent of the Uvalde Unified Consolidated Independent School District, said in an update to the school community on Friday.
Gutierrez will be "fulfilling her desire to support special education students across the district," Harrell said.
In her place, Christy Perez, previously the assistant principal of Uvalde High School, will serve as principal of the elementary school, Harrell said.
"Her background as both a teacher and a counselor will be invaluable in ensuring students have the support they need during the upcoming school year," the superintendent said of Perez.
Uvalde:365 is a continuing ABC News series reported from Uvalde and focused on the Texas community and how it forges on in the shadow of tragedy.
The move is the latest development in leadership at the elementary school, the site of one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history after a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers in May.
Late last month, Gutierrez was suspended with pay from her post as principal, before being reinstated three days later.
The district gave no reason as to why Gutierrez was placed on administrative leave. But the move came two weeks after a state probe into the massacre said that Gutierrez, in her first year at Robb Elementary School, was aware of security problems, such as a door not locking properly for one of the classrooms the gunman entered, but did not fix them.
The district's police chief, Pete Arredondo, remains on unpaid administrative leave. The Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District has recommended he be fired.
Arredondo has come under immense scrutiny for his role in the police response to the May 24 massacre, during which law enforcement waited 77 minutes after arriving at the school to breach the door to the classroom containing the gunman.
In their report, the Texas lawmakers investigating the shooting found that Arredondo had "failed to perform or to transfer to another person the role of incident commander."