BY WILLIAM FEOLA
In the wake of the Parkland, Florida shooting, local officers in New Jersey were critical of their counterparts in Florida for not taking enough action during the shooting, which took the lives of 17 people.
It is now known that not only did Scot Peterson, the armed school resource officer, not enter the school while the shooting took place, but three other Broward County Sheriff’s deputies were outside the school and did not enter as well.
Local officers weigh in on incident
In Hawthorne, New Jersey, a town that has armed retired police officers in their high school as well as active duty officers patrolling the area, officers were not happy with how the situation was handled in Parkland at all.
“When I saw that Peterson had not entered the building to neutralize the threat, I was disgusted,” said Peter VanderVelde, a retired officer who is one of the guards at Hawthorne High School. “When you sign up for this job, you know you may face the potential of facing an active shooter and the fact that he fled while 17 innocent people died bothers me to no end.”
It was no surprise that many of the officers shared this same sentiment as many of them faced a similar situation in 2010 when gang members were let into the high school by a student in an effort to assault and possibly kill another student because of gang-related issues. This was the reason the high school hired armed guards and asked for extra patrols around the area and as a result no major crimes have been committed there since.
“Thinking back to 2010, even though nobody was hurt or killed, I can’t think of one reason as to why I wouldn’t enter that school,” said police Lt. Robert King, who was a detective at the time of the incident. “My job is to protect and serve the community and to know that I went home that night with nobody injured or killed means I did my job correctly.
Arming teachers? Not so fast
As President Trump has made it clear these last few days, he is most definitely in favor of teachers carrying guns as a means to protect students, but that doesn’t mean everyone is.
Frank Giglio, a retired police sergeant as well as a firearms expert, says that it is “not the best idea” for teachers to just be given minimal training and weaponry and added that “guys like retired police officers and army veterans have years of valuable experience that would be beneficial God forbid one of these shootings were to happen again.”
Police officers go through extensive training to prepare and have the ability to handle these life or death situations. Police academy lasts 24 weeks, which includes a curriculum of intense physical and mental training, self-defense classes, firearms and water safety as well as driving courses. They have the most skill and training and police officers/military personnel offer the most when it comes to high-pressure situations.
“I absolutely would rather have a trained officer protecting my child than armed teachers,” said concerned parent Jackie Matthews, a life-long resident of Hawthorne. “I want the teachers to focus on teaching, not whether or not they have to take one of their students lives.”
Schools like East Brunswick have already implemented armed officers in their schools while New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio has already shot down the notion, citing the massive monetary costs.
Whether you want more gun control, armed security guards, armed teachers or none of the solutions mentioned, this seems like a battle that the country will be fighting with for quite some time. Check out some of the social media posts below as well as an audio clip of an officers reaction to see how the country has reacted to the whole situation.
Listen to Lt. William C. Feola of the Hawthorne police department talk about teachers being armed:
“I don’t believe arming teachers is a valuable idea because they have no training, experience or background with arms. I think that putting someone in place who has training, experience and is able to handle that would be a valuable deterrent to someone coming into a school to hurt someone.”
Washington State Governor Inslee tells Trump armed teachers plan won’t work at governors meeting at WH: “A little less tweeting here and more listening.”
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) February 26, 2018
Ivanka Trump says having armed teachers in American schools is ‘not a bad idea’ https://t.co/ecIp6nd5F5 pic.twitter.com/pArzzPh0lt
— Business Insider (@businessinsider) February 26, 2018
MULTIPLE ARMED OFFICERS WERE ON CAMPUS DURING THE FL SCHOOL SHOOTING AND THEY WERE UNABLE TO STOP A MASS SHOOTER WITH AN ASSAULT WEAPON.
WE CAN’T POLICE OURSELVES OUT OF THIS PROBLEM. WE NEED FEWER GUNS.
— igorvolsky (@igorvolsky) February 22, 2018
Can we come up with a volunteer force of retired police officers/fbi/ veterans to be armed protectors for our schools? Is this a plan that could work? Pls respond with your ideas?
— Martha MacCallum (@marthamaccallum) February 19, 2018
Related Links:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/florida-school-shooting-ranks-among-americas-deadliest/
https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/20/politics/donald-trump-bump-stocks/index.html
You did a good job of using in line and additional links to grow your story. The quotes and reporting really hit hard and gave an extra edge to the story. The tweets also added to what the quotes had displayed, and showed how much this impacts others.