One of the most despicable and horrific things that happened during the Parkland, Florida school shooting was the cowardice displayed by Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School resource officer Scot Peterson.

As shooter Nikolas Cruz went on his shooting spree, the largest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, Peterson never set foot in the building or did anything of any value to help stop the gunman or protect the lives of students.

After being totally disgraced for his lack of action, Peterson, 55, opted to retire from the force instead of allowing himself to be fired.

Now he’s drawing a monthly pension payment for an absurd amount of money, especially given what happened at Parkland.

Peterson, the Sun-Sentinel reported, has received a monthly state pension of $8,702.35 since April. He was paid $101,879.03 last year, according to the news outlet, which cited sheriff’s office records.

The former deputy stood by his actions after the shooting. His lawyer said in a statement at the time that “the allegations that Mr. Peterson was a coward and that his performance, under the circumstances, failed to meet the standards of police officers are patently untrue.”

Peterson hasn’t been criminally charged in relation to the shooting, but his pension benefits could possibly be forefeited, according to the Sentinel, pending a Florida state inquiry into how police responded to the shooting.

Peterson was named in a wrongful death suit last month by Andrew Pollack, father of shooting victim Meadow, who tweeted the former cop “let those children and teachers die.”

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There’s little doubt that Peterson should be held accountable for not intervening to save the lives of innocent people, especially since doing so is part of his jog description for which he was sworn in, making this clearly a dereliction of duty.

How many of those children would still be alive today if he had taken action? We’ll obviously never know, but we’ve seen several situations lately where an armed resource officer did the opposite of Peterson and ended up stopping situations from turning super deadly.

Peterson’s failure to act shouldn’t be looked at as a negative when it comes to having armed security in schools. This is still one of the best options available for keeping kids safe.

Source: Fox News