The US Justice Department will conduct an independent review of the police response to the recent mass shooting at a Texas junior school, amid mounting questions over law enforcement’s actions to stop the gunman. “The goal of the review is to provide an independent account of law enforcement actions and responses that day, and to identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare for and respond to active-shooter events,” said Department of Justice spokesman Anthony Coley in a statement. The review was requested by Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin and “will be fair, transparent and independent,” Coley added. On Tuesday, a teenage gunman stormed Robb Elementary School in the small Texas town of Uvalde, killing 19 children and two teachers, the latest in an epidemic of deadly mass shootings in the United States. Joe Biden lays wreath at shrine in Texas school massacre town In the wake of the shooting, the behaviour of the police has come under severe scrutiny as accounts emerge of their slow reaction. Texas authorities admitted on Friday that as many as 19 police officers were in the school hallway for nearly an hour before breaching the room the gunman was in and killing him, saying the officers mistakenly thought he had stopped killing and was now barricaded. Officials now call this delay a “wrong decision” but parents have expressed anger.