Audio recordings between police negotiators and shooter Omar Mateen capture police officials strategizing about how to talk to him during three-hour standoff

Police negotiators talking to the Orlando nightclub gunman at first weren’t sure if the person they had on the phone was actually in the Pulse nightclub, according to audio recordings released on Monday after a judge ruled they should be made public.

The audio recordings between police negotiators and shooter Omar Mateen do not stray from transcripts of conversations released previously by the city of Orlando. But they do capture something not in the transcripts: police officials strategizing among themselves about how to talk to Mateen, who hung up several times during the three-hour standoff at the gay nightclub.

A police official can be heard early on saying he is not convinced the person on the call is in the club.

At another point, the lead police negotiator, named Andy, said, “He sounds like he is in a very sterile environment, like he’s at a home or an apartment.” But then another police official said Mateen could be in an office or bathroom.

Circuit judge Margaret Schreiber ruled on Monday that Mateen’s calls should be made public. But she will not rule on releasing other 911 calls from the mass shooting until she has listened to them.

More than two dozen news groups, including the Associated Press, have been fighting the city in court over the release of more than 600 calls dealing with the worst mass shooting in modern US history. The city has released about two-thirds of the calls but is still withholding the 232 calls that lawyers for the city say depict suffering or killing and are exempt from Florida’s public records laws.

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The media groups have argued that the city’s application of the exemption is too broad and that the 911 calls will help the public evaluate the police response to the shooting at the gay nightclub.

During a hearing on Monday, the judge allowed family members of the 49 patrons who died to testify about whether they wanted the remaining 911 calls made public. The half dozen relatives and family representatives who testified said they opposed the release of audio recordings. Some said they would be comfortable with the release of a transcript but others objected to any release, even in written form.

“It would be extremely difficult for family and friends to listen to these calls,” said Jessica Silva, whose brother, Juan Rivera Velazquez, died with his partner in Pulse. “Just listening to one of the calls … We can recognize voices. Just listening to them screaming … How are we going to feel?”

The hearing also became a forum for several family members to express frustration at the lack of information they have received. Some said they hoped they would have a better understanding of what happened by listening to the calls.

The FBI has offered no indication of when the investigation into the shooting that also left 53 people seriously wounded will be done. An FBI spokeswoman did not immediately return an email seeking comment.

Aileen Carillo, whose brother, Simon Adrian Carillo Fernandez, died in the nightclub, said she would like to listen to the calls to help her understand what happened, but did not want them to be made public.

“I would like to know what happened. We haven’t really heard what happened. We are unaware of the facts,” Carillo said on the witness stand through a Spanish interpreter.

An attorney for the family of 18-year-old Akyra Murray, the youngest Pulse victim, said family members do not want the audio recordings released but would be OK with the release of a transcript.

“They feel that transparency is wanted,” said Richard Klineburger, an attorney from Philadelphia, where Murray’s family lives. “We do want to find out a real timeline because to this day, there are no answers.”