Retired Secret Service agent to review actions at Stoneman Douglas

A retired Secret Service agent has been hired to review what role school administrators and security staff played in the mass killing at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Steve Wexler will review the actions of school employees, including Principal Ty Thompson, the school’s assistant principals and security staff, during the Feb. 14 massacre that killed 17 people, school district officials say.

But the review will go further to include which procedures and circumstances may have affected the tragedy, Broward Schools Superintendent Robert Runcie said.

“It’s trying to look at everything as comprehen-

sively as possible,” Runcie said. “It’s not targeting any specific individual. We’re looking at the entire school so we can get some lessons learned and look at what we need to change at that school and any other school.”

It’s Wexler’s second time doing a school review.

In December 2017, Wexler warned administrators the school could be vulnerable to a gunman.

Gates were unlocked, students didn’t wear identification badges, active shooting drills were inadequate and a fire alarm could send students streaming into the halls and make them easy targets, Wexler said.

Wexler had conducted a security review of the school at the request of administrators and presented his findings to four staff members, but he never heard back from anyone at the school, he said.

The Sun Sentinel reported on June 8 that Wexler had given a highly critical assessment of lax school security at Stoneman Douglas. Several days after the story was published, Stoneman Douglas Assistant Principal Winfred Porter wrote a memo for district leaders summarizing Wexler’s visit to the school.

A copy, obtained by the Sun Sentinel under Florida’s public records law, is heavily redacted. The district cited legal protections governing school security in blacking out the information.

Porter wrote that he met with Wexler on Dec. 15, 2017, to solicit feedback on campus security, “utilizing his wealth of knowledge.”

Also attending the meeting were Security Specialist Kevin Greenleaf, Assistant Principal Denise Reed and a teacher.

Wexler had staged a mock scenario of an irate parent storming campus and successfully shooting people, exposing vulnerabilities to the administrative team.

The memo states that Wexler and the school officials discussed training early and often for an attack and notes that teachers and students were taught evacuation procedures on Jan. 11 — a month before the murders.

They also discussed “real, decoy and false” fire alarms. Gunsmoke set off the fire alarm in the massacre, drawing children into the hallways. The memo lists which of Wexler’s recommendations were implemented but the information is redacted.

The school district also blacked out Porter’s explanation of which recommendations were not implemented and why.

Philip Schentrup, whose daughter Carmen was killed in the massacre, said he thinks Thompson and Greenleaf should be removed from the school while the new review takes place. Runcie said neither was a specific target of the review and said they would remain in place while the review is done.

Schentrup attended a School Board meeting Tuesday and blamed the two for flaws at the school that he said contributed to the massacre.

“Why is the school board trusting the safety and security of our students to the same people who allowed this tragedy to happen in the first place? That’s the definition of insanity,” Schentrup said.

He blamed administrators for failing to act on Wexler’s recommendations. He said gates at the school were frequently left open, and he accused administrators of writing in discipline charts that killer Nikolas Cruz committed “minor behavior incidents” when he brought knives and bullets to school.

On the day of the shooting, administrators called for an evacuation, sending students outside of their classrooms, while Cruz was in the hallway firing, Schentrup said.

“Had they bothered looking at security cameras … they would have seen the massacre occurring,” Schentrup said. “Did anyone even know how to use the cameras?”

He accused Greenleaf of standing outside the building where the shooting happened and failing to call for an emergency lockdown. Thompson was not on campus at the time of the shooting.

Thompson, who has been principal since 2013, couldn’t be reached for comment despite an email and phone call.

When the shooting occurred Feb. 14, Thompson was on a plane that was still on the ground, headed on a vacation. Upon hearing the news, he immediately got off the plane and made his way to campus by about 5 p.m., a district spokeswoman said.

“As soon as he could get there, he got there,” said Lisa Maxwell, executive director of an association of Broward principals.

“Principals do everything in their power to keep their kids safe,” she said. “That is all they care about and want to do, in addition to educating them. Nobody purposefully ignores safety and security practices.”

Maxwell said they take the best advice they can from experts, such as Wexler, but have to consider other factors — such as fire codes, building codes and building maintenance — in implementing security measures.

This is the latest in a number of reviews and investigations. A state Marjory Stoneman Douglas Commission is also evaluating what went wrong on Feb. 14 and the days leading up to it.

Runcie said his original plan was to use those findings to understand what role school staff played, but as that investigation is expected to take about a year, he said he wanted to get answers more quickly.

There’s no specific deadline for Wexler, but Runcie said he wants the review finished “as fast as possible.”

So far two Stoneman Douglas security monitors, Andrew Medina and David Taylor, have lost their jobs since the shooting. Runcie chose not to renew either of them for the new school year.

Both were criticized for their perceived inaction during the shooting. Medina was the first to spot Cruz on campus, but he didn’t approach him or call for a lockdown, he told investigators. He said he instead radioed Taylor, who hid in a closet.

“Had they bothered looking at security cameras … they would have seen the massacre occurring.” Philip Schentrup, Parkland parent