Deputy who didn’t stop Florida shooting thinks he ‘did a good job’

NY Post ^ | February 22, 2018 | 10:57pm | David K. Li

[conservative98]

The sheriff’s deputy who failed to engage the shooter at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School “believed he did a good job” because he called in the location of the massacre and gave a description of the shooter, a top union official said Thursday.

School resource officer Scot Peterson, who resigned in disgrace from the Broward County Sheriff’s Office, was “distraught” about shooting that killed 17 people — but believed he did his duty, according to the president of the Broward Sheriff’s Office Deputies Association.

“He believed he did a good job calling in the location, setting up the perimeter and calling in the description (of Cruz),” said the union official, Jim Bell.

[Davy Crocket]

The Union will probably get his job back with back pay!

[ETCM]

I spoke to my former SRO friend after the shooting. Their protocol is get to the shooter at all cost. They do not stop and help injured, do not assist with evacuation. Get to the shooter ASAP. You find a way to stop him when you get there. That is why the Sheriff is so disgusted with the action the SRO took.

[DoughtyOne]

Sounds like a good school. I appreciate the mention.

I also appreciate you addressing an alternate reality, that few here have been able to grasp.

[tschatski]

That’s why you have to harden the entry. If the invader gets past the entry barrier the alarm should have already sounded and the armed staff on the way to that point. The invader is contained in an area with no innocents in the line of fire.

Schools have to have a whole package of protection and a well-practiced battle plan.

[Davy Crocket]

Yea he was out having coffee and a doughnut!

[KJC1]

I posted this on an earlier thread. I hope people pay attention:

The louder this Sheriff gets, the more questions I have which include:

1) What formal active-shooter training did the Sheriff provide to/mandate for his deputies, especially those assigned to schools?

2) Did this Deputy complete any such training? If so, when? If not, why not?

3) Why was this Deputy assigned to the school? Was it his seniority and he chose it, or was he put there to ride out until his retirement because of any disciplinary/problem history?

4) Was this Deputy given any kind of “stand down” order?

If anyone thinks my intent is to make excuses for this Deputy, it is NOT.

I think there may be more, higher, layers of this onion that need to be peeled.

The fact that this Sheriff came out so publically throwing his now former Deputy under the bus, so far as to say he “makes me sick” was a big red flag and unprofessional, and smells to me of someone trying to deflect blame.

[securityman]

https://twitter.com/fguzmanon7/status/966825501846274048

[OftheOhio]

Well there is at least one thing we agree on. It is a shame that those that are there to learn have to put up with all that they do. Those that won’t give in to being bullied are often the ones punished in the end. How whacked is that.

[DoughtyOne]

If you’ll think about first responders to a mass shooting in a large building, you’ll know that first single officers showing up on scene do not rush the building. One guy? No way!

Officers showing up on a scene like this generally have a long rifle of some sort, a bullet proof vest, and a whole slew of other officers in moments.

A swat team when called goes in as a group, even as heavily armed as they are. And sometimes they don’t even go right in. It depends.

[kelly4c]

This is a sad loss. What a brave young man. I hope the president awards a medal in his honor along with the coach and I believe also a teacher.

[Twink]

Same thing I was told by the Admin at my kids’ school after Sandy Hook. Same thing I’m told as an employee for the last 3 decades. Same thing I know as growing up in a cop and fireman family.

Life isn’t TV. So many posters don’t get that.

[DoughtyOne]

I agree Twink.

Right now potential shooters know they’re going into a situation where they will be the only person within 500 yards (or whatever it is), with a gun.

That really helped didn’t it.

I won’t what city officials that came up with that idea, have a big sign out front of their home declaring it a gun free zone?

Zero!

[Twink]

Excellent post!

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t really believe that.

Single officers who arrive at the scene of a mass shooting in a large building DO NOT rush the building.

Further, officers arriving at the scene of a mass shooting have long rifles of some sort, vests, and other officers on scene in seconds. Then they go in.

Even swat team member enter the facility with as a group with a highly organized method of attack.

[DoughtyOne]

Are you saying he shouldn’t get a break?

[familyop]

The attacker came out of one room after another with no bystanders in the backdrop from an ambushing cop's perspective. After the attack against students in the first room, the rest were out or trying to hide in other rooms.

If the policeman had a reasonable amount of cool (that is, not a hysterical state of mind), he could have fired from a low position (to avoid hitting bystanders) and hit as the attacker was coming out of a room.

That should have been known in advance in training. It should have been second nature for someone who knew the building so well and had the needed training to be there. The pistol would have also been an advantage over a rifle in a building with such small spaces.

A policeman doing security duty in that building should have run that kind of situation through his mind many times and actually moved through it physically many times, when the building was empty (no need to have a weapon in his hands while drilling).

Any requirement for multiple policemen to be at a mass murder incident will leave more victims dead. The time for backup to be at the site of the call will most often be too long.

And what about the reserve who is alone overnights on weekends with several thousand residents in a podunk town on the edge of a bigger, even more dirty city and has no backup due to rivalries and corruption in his jurisdiction? There's no union *brotherhood* crying for him. He can only get out of that line of work and wait another decade or so for feds and men in another jurisdiction to take down some local gangsters favorite sons.

Unrelated? The moral and point? Chickens eventually come home to roost. Corruption and bad policies within a system will be corrected someday. And someday does come.

Although safety is important wherever feasible, police work cannot honorably be made as physically safe, politically safe and physically easy as many other kinds of work. Chances must be taken, and training should be preparatory for such chances to be taken with no second thought (second nature).

[DesertRhino]

“Any children in the hallway, the nearby rooms, upstairs, downstairs, or even outside could have been hit while he shot at you.”

Pure cowardice. So your answer is to let him stroll around and murder at his leisure because you think you might make it worse?
And yeah, departments send every cop they can find. 20, 50, or more. But that isn’t so you can build up this huge force before you do anything. They cop ON THE SCENE has to start it off. Sucks when it’s you, but he should have.
And it isn’t nearly as suicidal as you are making out. In the overwhelming number of cases where an active shooter is engaged by a good guy, the mass murder stops as the bad guy seeks cover and tries to shoot back. Usually a suicide follows when the rat is cornered.

This isn’t some band of Spetsnaz. It’s one coward with a rifle who is very busy shooting little girls and boys, he’s distracted with fire alarms, screaming kids and his own tunnel vision. Most likely you can dump him and he’ll never even see it coming.

Sometimes you just got to be a man, even though it sucks.
And for all your sophistry, one question. If it was his own kid on the 3rd floor, think he would have waited outside? Honestly, I feel bad for the guy.

“To each there comes in their lifetime a special moment when they are figuratively tapped on the shoulder and offered the chance to do a very special thing, unique to them and fitted to their talents. What a tragedy if that moment finds them unprepared or unqualified for that which could have been their finest hour.”.
Winston Churchill

[DoughtyOne]

Saying, “He makes me sick”, is unprofessional.

Remember, if this guy were a normal LEO, his agency would refuse to comment on him pending litigation.

The department spokesman would be called out to speak to the press, and they would not trash an officer like this.

As you state, this sheriff is overplaying his hand, if I’m not mischaracterizing your thoughts there.

[zerosix]

Kinda reminds me of the “SWAT team” in Columbine HS that stood by for hours waiting while people who might have been saved from their injuries had they received emergency medical treatment, while the “crack police team” waited making certain none of them were shot!

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks Twink. I’m going to wrap this up and go to bed.

Take care.