Broward County Sheriff Department's Failures In Parkland Cannot Be Overstated

I’ve taken my shots at the FBI over the tragedy last week in Parkland, Florida. To be honest, I think those lumps are warranted. The Bureau’s field office didn’t do their jobs, plain and simple.

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However, they’re not the only ones who completely screwed the pooch. The Broward County Sheriff’s Department–the agency headed up by anti-gun Democrat Scott Israel–also did their fair share of dropping the ball. At least the FBI had the integrity to admit they made a mistake. Israel? Not so much.

For one thing, the department received 39 calls regarding the shooter. As Dana Loesch noted while confronting Israel about it:

“He’s sending messages threatening to kill people, that right there, under Florida State law….They were threatened with death. They were threatened that they were going to bleed. They were threatened that they were going to be killed. And he had already taken bullets and knives to school. He had already assaulted people. He assaulted his parent. He assaulted other students.  Thirty-nine visits. This was known to the law enforcement community. This is what I’m talking about. We have to follow up on the red flags.”

Israel denied the information was accurate, but it all comes from a CNN report where they list Israel’s department as their source.

Hmmm…sounds kind of fishy.

However, Israel’s own sins are minor compared to those of the school resource officer assigned to the school.

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A short while ago, the other shoe dropped. As it turned out, the Broward County Sheriff’s Department had an ARMED school resource officer on site. And he did NOTHING.

The school resource officer at Marjory Stoneman Douglas did not enter the school during the shootings that left 17 people dead last week, said Broward Sheriff Scott Israel.

“Never went in,” said Israel about the actions of Deputy Scot Peterson. The sheriff said Peterson remained outside for at least four minutes during the six minutes [the shooter] opened fire inside the school.

Despite being armed, video showed Peterson taking up a position outside the west side of the freshman building where the shootings occurred and remained there during the incident.

Israel announced Thursday that Peterson resigned after being suspended without pay following an investigation.

“Devastated, sick to my stomach, there are no words.” Israel said to describe his feelings when he learned Peterson did not enter the building.

“These families lost their children, we lost coaches. I’ve been to the funerals. I’ve been to the homes where they’re sitting shiva. I’ve been to the vigils. It’s just, there are no words.”

Here is where it becomes interesting.

Peterson was placed on restricted administrative assignment and surrendered his BSO identification card and weapons on Feb. 22. He was also prohibited from entering any BSO facility.

Two other BSO resource officers, Edward Eason and Guntis Treijs, have been placed on administrative duties pending further investigation. Both officers were involved in 23 calls for service at [the killer’s] home and may not have followed protocol.

That’s right. As he was crowing to the audience and television cameras about how he was looking after the students and slamming Dana Loesch for questioning police contacts with [the killer], he KNEW that his armed officer on the scene refused to enter the building as [the killer] was slaughtering students. He knew he’d already suspended two other officers for improperly handling their contacts with [the killer].

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We’ve been talking a lot about school security lately. However, the discussion becomes irrelevant when the one person charged with stopping an event like this refuses to even enter the building and attempt to stop the maniac.

I can’t see this as anything other than cowardice on this officer’s part.

However, I also see a series of failures on the part of the Broward County Sheriff’s Department. Especially since later Friday, we learned it was worse than we believed.

So there were four armed officers outside the school. And none of them did anything, according to CNN. They instead waited for Coral Springs police to lead the charge inside.

What’s more, Coral Springs City Manager Mike Goodrum apparently chewed out Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel over that malfeasance on February 15 — more than a week ago. Which means that Israel knew full well that his own office had botched everything dramatically when he stood on stage with CNN’s Jake Tapper and a crowd of angry parents and community members and blamed the National Rifle Association and Dana Loesch for his own horrible failure.

In other words, Scott Israel’s department dropped the ball at every level humanly possible. Not only that, but he knew his failings well before he got on television to lecture Americans on how we need to give up our rights.

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I’m sorry, we don’t need to give up anything. We need people like Scott Israel to step up and do their freaking jobs!

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