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.

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks for the additional comment.

The whole things sucks, from years earlier until after the event. What a mess.

All this, because agency after agency after agency after agency after agency after agency and others too, simply refused to do what should have been a bells and whistles no-brainer.

[DoughtyOne]

You know what, I would have been talking about all the agencies that failed their duty. I would have been telling the populace that I would do my best to make sure everyone who knew about this guy and didn’t take action, would never work in the same line of work again.

[DoughtyOne]

The shooter was spending enough time in each room, to shoot a number of people. Some of those people survived. Who’s to say they would have if an officer charged in and a gunfight ensued.

Yes, perhaps the officer would have prevailed. I can see some rather clear reasons why that might have been next to impossible, but let’s say he did save kids.

What happens if he goes in, the crossfire winds up killing five more, and the officer dies also? What would that have accomplished?

[DoughtyOne]

The FBI
The sheriff’s department
The local police department
The local D. A.’s office
The local courts (judges have the discretion to put a guy like this on probation)
The probation department
The school system
The local family services department
The foster child placement system
The former foster parents
The current foster parents

Individuals in each of these agencies are required by law to report individuals that could be a threat to children.

Every person who reviewed this kid, should be fired for not making sure he didn’t fall through the cracks, being the threat he was.

[DoughtyOne]

I would be saying the same thing I’m saying now.

Sh_t happens, and sometimes you can’t prevent it or stop it as quickly as you’d like.

I’m not in favor of trading one life for another. The deputy running in getting killed would not make me thrilled.

[DoughtyOne]

I agree with that. I appreciate your thoughts on the topic.

I wrote this to another person a few minutes ago. It’s probably worth reposting even if on the same thread and a few posts away.

- - -

The FBI
The sheriff’s department
The local police department
The local D. A.’s office
The local courts (judges have the discretion to put a guy like this on probation)
The probation department
The school system
The local family services department
The foster child placement system
The former foster parents
The current foster parents

Individuals in each of these agencies are required by law to report individuals that could be a threat to children.

Every person who reviewed this kid, should be fired for not making sure he didn’t fall through the cracks, being the threat he was.

[DoughtyOne]

What I argue for his guy, is not necessarily what I would do. I told one person on the thread I wouldn’t, but in the spur of the moment, I might do it. You can’t tell until you are confronted with it.

If I were to go into the school, I would hate to think I would race to my kid’s room to make sure they were safe.

Every one of those kids is your kid. The question is, can you really help or not.

As for the incident you posted about, I cannot for the life of me understand why a group of officers would not go in.

If I were with only one other person, there’s no question that I would go in. Two people taking a guy on has a much much better chance of success.

[DoughtyOne]

“:^)

[DoughtyOne]

I had meant to link you to a note where I said I was leaving for the night and would be back today.

The link you got instead was unintentional. Sorry about that.

I have since responded to your post, and I think it was a reasoned response.

Take care.

[DoughtyOne]

That’s okay. You don’t have to buy it.

I do.

I’m not requiring him to go in and commit suicide.

Add one more officer to the mix, and I’m in. One guy by himself, I’m not in. If he chooses to go in, I’m fine with it. If he doesn’t choose to go in, I’m not going to trash him for it.

[DoughtyOne]

Good for you, and I’m glad it turned out decently.

[Lera]

[[Wait! Are you saying he was a policeman? A real one?

I thought he was just a security guard!]]

School resource officers are real policemen assigned to the schools . They pretty much don’t ever do anything

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t have a problem with those comments.

Some folks reason this deputy had a gun, so he was obligated to go in. I’m not there on this.

What you say about folks who do go in vs those who don’t, it isn’t always as clear cut as it looks in the rear view mirror.

I would be weighing what the chances of helping the person would be if I were able to get to the person in need. Would there be enough cover for me to reasonably help them vs simply being picked off like they were.

If some guy is coming in to help me, I would never ask him to come in to die. I would only want him to come in if he could live and help me. Of course the risk would have to be limited to the transition, not when he was at my side.

If he would be under fire at my side, I would want him to refrain from coming to my side. If I’m dying I want help. If that help means my friend has to die, no way. Stay out of it and live.

[DoughtyOne]

While that is a reasoned conclusion, I’m not entirely sure that sheriff is a good guy.

I’m not convinced he had to address that officer at all in public, and to open him up to this kind of ridicule is hardly ever done.

I’d be a lot more impressed if that sheriff’s department wasn’t involved in looking the other way concerning this shooter.

“Hey, sure we have blood on our hands, but never-mind that. He has blood on his. What a terrible person HE is.

Something doesn’t ring true on that.

[DoughtyOne]

I’m not convinced I wouldn’t do what you mention. I don’t want to say I definitely would either. It would be a spur of the moment decision, and I’d have to do a gut check to move ahead.

When I say that, I mean I’d have to evaluate the setting and other circumstances for a reasoned chance of success. If there was very little chance of success (10/90%), I think it becomes more pointless to try it.

I understand these are just kids. It seems to me once the guy has a drop on the school, he’s inside, it’s very difficult to stop him.

If I had another officer with me, there’s no question what I would do. I would go in because two can manipulate his attention and get a clear shot off.

Your point about this not being a hostage situation is a reasoned one. I’d given that aspect of it thought too. It is different.

When I mention numbers of officers and swat, I’m trying to remind folks that it is almost universally recognized that one individual is not enough for this type of situation.

I believe most of the posters here dismiss that, to condemn this guy.

Knowing the layout can be used to buttress the idea this guy should have had the upper hand. Actually, it could make it clear to him in this situation a one man response was not a viable option.

I appreciate the reasoned response.

This is a topic I would generally take a pass on, except for what I perceived to be everyone going after this guy. I didn’t think it was quite that cut and dried, and I wanted to see the guy get some support.

In the end we may see him as a very bad character here. I’m not convinced yet. There is a lot of responsibility for this. Here are some of the entities I’ve tagged as being contributing factors.

- - - - -

The FBI
The sheriff’s department
The local police department
The local D. A.’s office
The local courts (judges have the discretion to put a guy like this on probation)
The probation department
The school system
The local family services department
The foster child placement system
The former foster parents
The current foster parents

Individuals in each of these agencies are required by law to report individuals that could be a threat to children.

Every person who reviewed this kid, should be fired for not making sure he didn’t fall through the cracks, being the threat he was.

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks for your child-like response.

An officer moving into the classroom has to identify the location of the shooter, move into a stance to engage, and fire.

A shooter in the classroom only has to hear the door and aim at the entry way.

If the officer is right handed and has to turn hard right to shoot, it will take him a moment to do so. In that moment the perp will fire five to seven rounds into the officer.

The officer trying to get off a shot may be hit as he fires, causing his aim to go off target.

Speaking of too stupid it’s not even funny, you don’t have a clue here.

This isn’t a video game. It’s real life.

In the scenario I laid out for you here, there are two problems. One, the officer is dead. Two, errant shots could take out another child. And then the shooter would proceed with what his intent in the first place was.

All you have achieved here is adding one or more to the body count, and not ending the shooting at all.

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t get the three figure suicides figure.

[familyop]

"I know we all wish this hadn't happened, or it had been stopped at 12 victims, but I'm not sure if this guy had run right in he would have stopped this incident right then and there."

That's true. Many situations are surprising and unexpected for police. I'll try to take a little more time with arguments more carefully written here in order to avoid any misunderstanding.

In cleaner jurisdictions, police are required to act alone more than most people are led to believe. Many have done so successfully. When an attacker is in the act of trying to murder his victims, an officer must immediately try to stop the attacker.

A calm car stop requiring an arrest of a likely dangerous someone will sometimes wait for backup. An arrest of a potentially dangerous someone asleep in his bed or high on a drug and not attacking anyone at the time might wait for a team. Not so for an attack in progress.

For other examples, a robbery or home invasion in progress must be stopped as quickly as physically possible by he who arrives alone or arrives first. If he is already on site, he must do it right now. If several officers arrive at the same time without waiting for each other, that's better.

Maybe there's a jurisdiction that allows for victims to be killed, while one officer on site waits for backup. As a local constituent, though, I wouldn't willingly, politically allow such a jurisdiction to continue that kind of policy.

How does a police officer have a better chance at prevailing in situations that would appear to weight against him? Better training and more training is the real edge. It's always been that way. So yes, backup when time allows. If a life might be saved by acting now, then act now.

[BykrBayb]

Flippancy is the only appropriate response, when discussing the incredible feats some of these folks are so sure they would accomplish. I think they’ve been watching too many cartoons.

[DoughtyOne]

I haven't been on in a while and i guess I should not say any thing but you seem to be stepping hard on some people saying how stupid they are that they expected the policeman to do something more than he done that they had no right to expect him to place his life in danger that he might get killed.

You should be voicing your opinion just like everyone else.  It isn't the idea he shouldn't have placed his life in danger so much as the reality him doing so may not have had any positive effect here.  Him getting killed and the shootings continuing would not have been productive.  It would have merely added one more to the body count.

You also said if the guy was 30 ft away he wouldn't have much of a chance of hitting him with his handgun.

Over the last year or so, I've read some rather shocking (at least to me) stats on police shootings.  Rounds miss a whole lot more than I had thought, what with them going to the range rather often, and having to meet requirments for such things.  A guy with a rifle is much more likely to hit center mass over and over.  That was where I was coming from here.

Well I should not say anything; but the more you post the harder you come down on people which seems a little off for you and I;ll try to take a little heat off the others.

Again, I appreciate your comments.  So far I have no problem with them.  I try not to come down on folks harder than they come down on me.  You may find places where I did, and I don't object to be called on it when I do.

To say the officer has no obligation to place himself in a situation where he may get in a gun fight is not really right.

I have not tried to make such a claim.  What I have tried to mention is if the room is 60 feet from cover, it's just plain suicide for an officer to go up against a guy with a rifle from that range.  Entering into a lethal situation where you have a chance of prevailing is reasoned.  Entering into one where you can't prevail, you'll just wind up dead without ending the killing, is a waste.  I would not support that.

He knowingly chose a job that was very good chance that it could happen and was certainly one of the risks might have to take.

He knowingly chose a job where he could help kids in trouble, IF it was feasible to do so.  He did not sign on to a job that required him to commit suicide at some point.  Just because and officer is armed, he is not 100% required to enter into a situation when there is not hope of success.  If the circumstances are such that there is a 'reasoned' chance of success, then by all means go for it.

This is like those people who sign up for our volunteer military in the past during peace time to see the world dress up like a real soldier and then screaming their heads when a conflict breaks out and bullets start flying saying this ain't fair didn't sign up for this.

Not really.  I do get the seeming equivelancy, but even in live fire situations, there are more reasoned situations than others.  In a military setting there can be live fire skirmishes, but there is a plan and at least a reasoned chance of success in most instances.  Sometimes you're asked to enter into action where there is a low chance of success, but then it's to advance a cause that will be affected favorably, even if your demise occurs.  In this situation with the deputy we may have been looking at sure demise with very little likelihood of overall positive impact.  I get where you were headed, but I think it is different for several reasons.

Also you imply that he would be committing suicide to have to go in the building because the guy would have seen him and if he could not get closer than thirty feet he would have little chance of hitting him or doing any good.

Yes the guy with the rifle most of the time has the advantage over the guy with the handgun but not always.

If you think that a .45 auto, 357 .44 or.45 revolver are not capable against a man size target at ranges of fifty to a hundred yards with standard iron sights then you haven't done much shooting or been trained around men who can really shoot.

Shooting on the rage is great practice.  I'm not going to deny you have a point there.  When it comes to high pressure situations, the stats show that officers do not meet their normal range performances.  Now I'm not an expert on this by any means, but I read a number of articles on this in 2017, and I was very suprised at how hard it is to hit the target when you're in a life-threatening situation.  While I said 30 feet, and I think you could take me to task on that range, this could have been a situation where upwars of 60-90 feet could have been involved.  In a pressure situation, I think it's very iffy if a handgun could prevail..

I mean come on, most clubs and private ranges have the old 100yd gong and some years before these wonderful computer lathes and ugly but light plastic marvels, I have seen guys pull out their little Beretta .25's and Colt 380's auto backup and 2".38's and play Johnnie Come Marching Home in b flat. Lets not forget this officer was a veteran police officer and this was an untrained 19 coward proved by the targets he chose and he didn't expect any one to show up very quickly and with all the running and screaming and him shooting he was focusing on them and this should have able to tell from the shots and yells where he was located and to approached without being surprised.

Upon entering a room, you have to open the door.  Some of those rooms really echo, when the door is opened.  So when you do so, the shooter is alerted, and all they have to do is point at the door, adjust and shoot as you enter.  You have to scan the room, adjust your stance, and fire.  The shooter has enough of a drop on you to place 5-7 shots into you before you know what's even happened.  This guy could be called a coward because of his targets, but he was a lone person using lethal force, was likely sure to be confronted, and arrested, if not killed outright.  I'm not sure I'd go with coward.  He was willing to die doing this.  He was definitely screwed up in the head, and perhaps hell bent on a police involved suicide.

I guess what really bothered me was I believe was thinking about his retirement and the money.

Would you be thinking of your retirement?  Why is it you think this guy had to be?  Perhaps knowing the layout and all the considerations I've mentioned, he saw the futility in taking the action some folks think he was obligated to.

I mean he tried to say he done what he thought was best and I might have given him benefit of the doubt I usually do to most people, especially our policemen my Dad was one for a number of years and my brother and nephew were firemen and retired from them.

But this guy had no intention to stand by his statement but resigned as quickly as he could after his statement.

He ran before any thing could be looked into to see if he acted in an appropriate manner.

What I would respond with here, is that he may have seen internals on the Sheriff's attitude, and decided it was best to resign.  If your own people aren't going to stand behind you, you have no choice.  I want to touch on that too.  The police department(s) down there didn't lift a finger to stop this kid from doing what he did.  So what we have here is a very tainted department(s) going after this guy, when they themselves could have prevented this easily.  I'm simply not buying this righteous indignation down there.  There's a ton of blame to go around, and in light of that, it's my position everyone should shut up until the heads roll across about ten different entities.  And head should roll across them.  I've listed some agencies at the bottom that have complicity in this..

If he stayed and it was found that he did not do his job if fired he could lose probably half of his retirement even more if it was a serious breech.

So he did not even wait to see if he would be even investigated but resigned and locked in his 75% of his eighty thousand a year retirement.

I believe that you, I, and anyone else who goes through life should be able to defend themselves to the extent they can.  This guy put in many years of service, had a good record, and had an incident pop up on one day.  I'm not convinced he should forfeit his pension based on one bad day out of roughly 12,500 days.

As Quick as it happened he had to be in process or finished before his speech.

If he could read the tea leaves from his superiors, he was probably smart to do so.  I've seen superiors sell out their employees on a whim, so this wouldn't be the first time I've seen superiors do something questionable to cover their own posteriors.  I will say that this is my take on it right now.  Over time I may alter my opinion of this, but I am not near convinced he should lose his pension.

We seen what happened when a real police approached him with no cover with his weapon in this little monsters face he stuck his nose in the dirt.

I did not see that, but I would be interesed in how that scene played out.  Was one officer alone?  Did he have the drop on the guy?

I'm not trying to make this guy the scapegoat but there is a load of that to be wrapped around the FBI and local police who needs to be where they were at the beginning reduced unarmed and behind a desk doing lab and paper work to support the states police organizations.

I'm not sure I understood this accurately, but I believe you were saying there's blame in a number of places here.  Again, I have mentioned some entities below that stuck out to me.  We're not all going to agree on this.  The reason I entered this thread was because I was seeing a lot of folks trashing this guy, and I wasn't convinced he was as bad a guy as they were trying to make him out to be.  On certain issues I'll take a pass, if it looks like both sides are getting some play.  Here it didn't seem like that, so I jumped in..

Since the 1960's most of what they and the CIA seem to do is spy on Americans for the democrat and republican election committees , refuse to cooperate with each while trying to get the biggest chunk of the budget money and to bust the whistle blowers and cover up the crimes that they expose committed by our politicians.

I agree with the the general outline of that.  I think we could both go a lot deeper on it, especially right now with this Russia Collusionn game going on, and Mueller being completely out of control.

Thank you for your thoughts on this.

Entities that are culpable here:

The FBI
The sheriff's department
The local police department
The local D. A.'s office
The local courts (judges have the discretion to put a guy like this on probation)
The probation department
The school system
The local family services department
The foster child placement system
The former foster parents
The current foster parents

Individuals in each of these agencies are required by law to report individuals that could be a threat to children.

Every person who reviewed this kid, should be fired for not making sure he didn't fall through the cracks, being the threat he was.