Broward County Sheriff Sidesteps Question When Asked If His Deputies at the Scene of the Florida Shooting Were Told to “Stand Down”


Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel avoided a clear answer when CNN’s Jake Tapper asked him if four deputies who waited outside while the shooting was underway were ordered over the radio to stand down during the Parkland school shooting. Be sure to watch all three short videos. [Listen carefully, and you will recognize that the sheriff appears to be building an explanation that a stand-down order may have been sent out by a deputy officer who was not authorized to give such an order. If so, they might be preparing a scapegoat to take the heat off the Sheriff. We shall see.] -GEG

It was reported this week that not only did school resource officer Scot Peterson not enter the school when he knew the shooting was happening, but three other sheriff’s deputies also waited behind their vehicles while the shooter killed 17 people inside the school.

Tapper first asked Israel if it was “policy” for the Broward County Sheriff’s department to “set up a perimeter” before going into the school to stop the shooter. Israel had said in an interview after the Fort Lauderdale airport shooting that he learned it was important for officers to set up a “staging area” before entering the premises, but he denied that such strategy applied to the Parkland school shooting.

“Jake, you’re completely talking apples and oranges,” Israel said. “When we have a horrific incident of any magnitude and the incident is over and people are arriving to help and we know we have 5, 10, 12 hours of work to do, we have our police officers, fire fighters, deputies go to staging areas.”

“An active shooter is completely different,” he asserted. “This is an active shooter, we push to the entry, to the killer, we get in and we take out the threat.”

However, Israel dodged when asked if the deputies may have received a “stand down” order that prevented them from entering the school.

Read full article here…