During the Parkland high school shooting on February 14, 2018, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in the suburban town of Parkland in Broward County, Florida, Scot Ralph Peterson arrived on the scene as a responding Broward County deputy sheriff, and he remained outside the building while the incident took place. Seventeen people were killed and another 17 were injured in the shooting, and the shooter, Nikolas Cruz, was able to flee from the scene without being apprehended until more than an hour later. The incident was, and currently remains, the deadliest mass shooting at a high school in U.S. history. In the aftermath of the shooting, Peterson was strongly criticized for not entering the building to pursue and engage with the shooter, but he later said that at the time he thought the shooter was outside of the building.