Former Florida deputy is on trial for failing to confront Parkland Gunman

Seven months after the Parkland, Fla., school shooting shooter was sentenced to life in prison for the murders of 14 students and three staff members, prosecutors Wednesday tried to convince a jury that a former sheriff’s deputy was also criminally charged. should be held responsible for not intervening to stop the carnage.

The deputy, Scot Peterson, was a school resource officer at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School at the time of the 2018 shootings. Because he did not confront the shooter, he faces 10 charges, including seven counts of child neglect — a rare prosecution of a law enforcement officer involved in the response to a mass shooting.

In opening statements, the prosecution repeatedly noted that after arriving on the afternoon of Feb. 14, Mr. Peterson remained in a stairway of an adjacent school building while the shootings took place in Building 1200.

“The defendant will never leave that niche while the shooter is in that building,” said Steven Klinger, an assistant state attorney in Broward County. “He doesn’t even let it sit for 30 or 40 minutes when everything is done.”

The defense offered a blunt answer.

“We’re here because my client was sacrificed,” said Mark Eiglarsh, Mr Peterson’s lawyer, arguing that Mr Peterson was only on trial because more powerful law enforcement officers had tried to assuage grieving parents’ anger by making him a scapegoat. “He was thrown under the bus. He’s not a criminal.”

The sound of gunfire echoed off buildings on the 45-acre school campus when the shootings lasted about six minutes, Mr. Eiglarsh said, and Mr. Peterson “couldn’t make out exactly where the shots were coming from.” The defense, he added, had 22 witnesses similarly confused that day.

“There was a distinct echo and reverberation that the witnesses will talk about, which made them hear the same shots and wonder ‘Where did that come from?'” said Mr Eiglarsh.

Only one person was at fault, Mr. Eiglarsh said, posting a photo of the convicted gunman, Nikolas Cruz, for the jury to see, calling him a “sick, deranged monster.”

Mr. Peterson, dressed in a blue suit and red tie, listened attentively and took notes during the opening statements. The courtroom was packed with onlookers, including his wife and daughter.

A conviction of a member of law enforcement for inaction during a mass shooting could have profound implications for policing in Florida and beyond, legal experts say. Mr. Peterson faces decades in prison on charges of failing in his role as the student’s caretaker.

Mr. Peterson was the first officer on the scene and he said he did not rush to Building 1200 at the high school, where the gunman killed 17 people and injured 17 others. Instead, he took cover in the stairway of the adjacent building, in part because he said he feared a sniper was firing from outside.

Mr. Peterson also directed other officers away from where the gunman fired an AR-15-style weapon on campus in Parkland, an affluent community about 20 miles northwest of Fort Lauderdale.

The trial, which is expected to take two months, is likely to highlight issues police departments across the United States have been grappling with since the 1999 Columbine school shooting, said Robert Jarvis, a professor of law at Nova Southeastern University. in South Florida.

Before Columbine, officers were told to wait for SWAT teams to confront mass shooters, but “ever since then, we expect the police to come in,” Mr. Jarvis said. “It’s a very interesting question what we expect from the police.”

That expectation was underscored in May 2022 when police in Uvalde, Texas, waited more than an hour before entering a classroom at Robb Elementary School, where an 18-year-old man had shot and killed 19 students and two teachers. The gunman was eventually killed by members of a U.S. Border Patrol tactical team, and subsequent investigations blamed Texas police for failing to act quickly.

In the Parkland case, the charges against Mr Peterson relate to the deaths and injuries on the third floor of the building, which prosecutors say he had a chance to stop. According to an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the gunman was on his way to the third floor 73 seconds after Mr. Peterson arrived at Building 1200 in a golf cart. bulletproof vests.

Mr. Peterson is charged with seven counts of child neglect in the deaths of four students and the wounding of three others, aged 14 to 17. He also faces three counts of culpable negligence for the death of an 18-year-old student. and a 35-year-old cross country coach and a teacher’s injury.

In the run-up to the trial, Mr. Eiglarsh, the defense attorney, persuaded Judge Martin Fein of the Broward County Circuit Court to dismiss the child neglect charges, arguing that they were not warranted under Florida law.

To be convicted of child neglect, state law says, the person must be a caretaker of the child. Mr Eiglarsh argued that the law does not include the police in the definition of a carer.

Judge Fein noted that the Florida Supreme Court and other state appeals courts had found that a teacher, a babysitter, and even a kidnapper were caretakers under the law. evidence presented at trial.

Mr Jarvis, the law professor, said finding a school resource officer as a caretaker for thousands of students “would impose liability when no one thought it would apply.”

He added that prosecutors also face a daunting task in convincing the six jurors and four deputies that Mr Peterson is guilty of culpable negligence. To do this, they must demonstrate that Mr. Peterson knew or should have known that his actions – or omissions – put students and staff at risk.

Mr Peterson is also charged with perjury, with prosecutors accusing him of lying to investigators by telling them he only heard two or three shots coming from the building and that he saw no students running when he was arrested. in the stairwell with gun drawn.

While other witnesses described the confusion surrounding the shooting, many told investigators it sounded to them like the gunfire was coming from Building 1200.

Mr. Peterson said he wasn’t sure.

“I didn’t even think it was in the building because it was so bright and loud,” he said, according to a Florida Department of Law Enforcement report. “At that point I knew it was close to this building, but I wasn’t even sure it was in the building.”

Mr. Peterson, who would lose his $104,000 annual pension if convicted, retired after the shooting and was retroactively fired. He was released on bail and moved to North Carolina.

He has expressed deep regret for the deaths.

“It’s spooky,” he said The Washington Post in June 2018. “I shortened that day a thousand ways with a million different what-if scenarios, but the bottom line is I was there to protect, and I lost 17 of them.”

But Mr. Peterson also insisted that he follow police procedures.

“I’ve got my gun and I’m scanning, and I’m looking. And that’s what we’re trained for.” he told NBC. “If you — if you get a position and cover it, we’re trained to scan and watch.”

But state investigators said Mr. Peterson, who was an active shooting instructor for the school system, ignored crucial parts of the training.

“If you are on the scene or nearby and hear gunshots, immediately access what you have and prepare to respond,” researchers wrote, quoting from the active shooting training. “Remember that every time you hear a gunshot in an active shooting incident, you have to believe another victim is being killed.”