Dad of Parkland Victim Files Lawsuit Against School Resource Officer
Source: Sun Sentinel
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - Andrew Pollack, the father of one of the 17 Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting victims, has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against former Broward Sheriff Deputy Scot Peterson, gunman Nikolas Cruz and several others.
Peterson, who was the Parkland school's resource officer at the time of the Feb.14 attack, has come under immense public criticism for failing to enter the building while the shooting was taking place.
Pollack's suit, filed in Broward Circuit Court on Monday, also listed as defendants the estate of Lynda Cruz, James Snead, Kimberly Snead, Henderson Behavioral Health, Jerome Golden Center for Behavioral Health INC, and South County Mental Health Center, INC.
The wrongful death lawsuit is seeking unspecified damages and a trial by jury.
"I'm not interested in any money," said Pollack, whose 18-year-old daughter Meadow was killed. "I just want to expose what a coward (Peterson) was and that he could've saved everybody on the third floor. I don't want him to go anywhere in the country and not have people recognize what a coward he is."
Peterson, a 33-year law enforcement veteran, resigned from the Broward Sheriff's Office on Feb. 23 after video footage showed he never entered the building after the gunman opened fire inside. Sheriff Scott Israel condemned Peterson's inaction, saying the resource officer should have "went in. Addressed the killer. Killed the killer." Cont..
Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dad-of-parkland-victim-files-lawsuit-against-school-resource-officer/ar-AAwzQre
Pub. 8 hrs. ago.
Cattledog
(5,919 posts)Igel
(35,356 posts)Bitter, in pain, and full of hate because *something* should have been done. We need reasons for why bad things happen. He's found his. But pain can squash empathy; too often empathy and tolerance are reserved for those that we like and support, when they're most humanizing when directed at those we have differences with.
The school cop might have been able to stop Cruz. But if he hadn't and was dead, I suspect this dad would have been just fine with that. Then again, he might have been able to. And it's possible he could have failed and still come out unscathed: The attempt does not have to prove fatal.
christx30
(6,241 posts)an attempt was made, rather than hiding in relative safety while his child was brutally murdered. If I was in the dads place, Id be bitter too. Id be screaming at the top of my lungs that this cop was a coward, every day, to anyone that would listen.
appalachiablue
(41,171 posts)mainstreetonce
(4,178 posts)School systems would be sued if an armed teacher doesn't stop a threat.
peabody
(445 posts)I hadnt thought of that.
Corgigal
(9,291 posts)with the sound of a AK gun shots going off. It's suicide, but let a judge and jury tell the poor parent that. The gun is the problem, not the cop. Secret Service has to specially trained to jump in front of gunfire, but you never will know until it's your central nervous system.
Nitram
(22,877 posts)themselves. While I feel some empathy for the resource officer who hid outside, keeping this in the forefront of the news is a powerful argument against the gun lobby's arguments that giving everybody guns is better than reasonable gun regulation.
It's a awful position, especially against a AK. However, a hurt parent needs to do what they need to do.