Police officers who initially responded to the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, last month are being called out as cowards for their "abject failure" to more rapidly engage the 18-year-old shooter who massacred 19 fourth-grade children and two adults.

One recent report, for instance, said that Uvalde Police and other first-in law enforcement officers waited more than 75 minutes before engaging the shooter at Robb Elementary School.

Now, the top Texas law enforcement officer is adding fuel to the fire with a claim that officers could have actually engaged with, and stopped, the 18-year-old gunman within "minutes."

The fact that they did not was an "abject failure" on their part, according to the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety.

"There's compelling evidence that the law enforcement response to the attack at Robb Elementary was an abject failure and antithetical to everything we've learned over the last two decades since the Columbine massacre," said Col. Steve McCraw, the department's director.

"Three minutes after the subject entered the West building, there was a sufficient number of armed officers wearing body armor to isolate, distract, and neutralize the subject," McCraw continued.

"The only thing stopping the hallway of dedicated officers from entering rooms 111 and 112 was the on-scene commander who decided to place the lives of officers before the lives of children," he continued.