PARKLAND, FLA. (WSVN) - Families of the victims killed at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School back in 2018 say a reenactment of the shooting clearly demonstrated that a former school resource officer could have heard and determined the origins of the gunshots.
On Friday, gunfire erupted again at the school as part of the reenactment by ballistics experts of the massacre that left 14 students and three staff members dead.
The reenactment was part of a civil lawsuit by the victims’ families and the wounded that accuses the Broward County deputy assigned to the school, Scot Peterson, of failing in his duty to protect them and their loved ones. Peterson, who was acquitted at a criminal trial in June, has said that because of echoes he could not pinpoint the shooter’s location.
However, David Brill, an attorney representing the families, said the reenactment debunks that notion.
“There is no dispute, none, zero, that the shots were clearly audible to Peterson,” said Brill.
In an interview with 7News, Brill said the reenactment closely replicated the conditions of the shooting. The weapon’s caliber, the firing locations, and the status of doors being open or closed were all carefully considered in the reenactment.
“So if the shot was coming from the third flood, you would hear and feel a ‘boom’ and know instantly that it was coming from the building,” said Brill. “It was correlated exactly with Peterson’s movements to the extent possible millisecond.”
“This was as close to a mirror image reenactment of the shots, the killer’s movements and Peterson’s, as I submit anyone could do,” Brill said.
Peterson’s legal counsel has countered the reenactment’s findings, arguing that it remains impossible to fully replicate the gun’s angle and therefore definitively conclude whether he could have heard the gunshots or determined their origin.
“There’s no possible way that Scot Peterson didn’t hear the 70 rounds from an AR-15 when he was just feet away from that building,” said Max Schachter, whose 14-year-old son Alex died in the shooting.
It is still unclear whether or not the results of the reenactment will actually be admitted into court, which is something the judge will decide.
As for the school’s 1200 building, it is also unclear when it will be demolished with school’s opening up again later in August.
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