11-year-old who survived Uvalde shooting testifies before House panel

Miah Cerrillo, the 11-year-old girl who smeared herself with her friend’s blood and pretended to be dead during the shooting rampage at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, was among several people who testified before a House panel Wednesday.

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Miah testified via video about the day a gunman burst into her classroom, shot her teacher, Eva Mireles, and began shooting her classmates.

According to the fourth-grader, the incident began when Mireles received an email (presumably about the shooter) and moved to lock the door to the room.

Mireles made eye contact with the shooter, Miah said, then her teacher told the children to “go hide.”

Miah went on to describe her teacher’s murder, saying the gunman shot Mireles in the head and then “shot some of my classmates,” including her friend who was next to her. She said she picked up her teacher’s cellphone and called 911 for help, asking emergency operators to “send the police to our classroom.”

Miah said when the shooter went into an adjacent room and began firing, she got “a little blood and I put it all over me” and she stayed quiet, pretending to be dead. Her father said earlier that she laid on top of her friend’s body.

The House Oversight and Reform Committee heard from nine witnesses as legislators face pressure to reform gun laws in the wake of several mass shootings last month.

Miah survived the May 24 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde that took the lives of 19 students and two teachers, Mireles and Irma Garcia.

>> Texas elementary school shooting: Eva Mireles remembered as teacher, mother, hero

Miah was injured in the attack, as well, when multiple bullet fragments hit her in the back.

In addition to Miah’s testimony, the committee heard from survivors and victims of the mass shooting in a Buffalo, New York, grocery store that took 10 lives; a pediatrician from Uvalde; the parents of a victim of the Uvalde shooting and others.

Those testifying included: Zeneta Everhart, the mother of Buffalo shooting victim Zaire Goodman; Felix and Kimberly Rubio, the parents of Uvalde shooting victim Lexi Rubio; and Dr. Roy Guerrero, the sole pediatrician in Uvalde.

The also heard from: Greg Jackson, Jr., executive director of Community Justice Action Fund; Joseph Gamaglia, Buffalo police commissioner; Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association; and Nick Suplina, senior vice president for law and policy at Everytown for Gun Safety.

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