The commission to review what happened at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last February has come to a pretty obvious conclusion: there was several opportunities during the shooting itself when the shooter could have been stopped by an armed guard. But that didn’t happen.

And what’s worse, we know WHY it didn’t happen.

Sheriff Bob Gualtieri of Pinellas County, head of Florida's state-appointed commission investigating the Parkland shooting, said today that video from inside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School showed the gunman, Nikolas Cruz, had to reload his AR-15 assault rifle several times.

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

"There were several other times when he was in that school that his gun was empty," the sheriff said, noting that the rifle had a six-round magazine. A reload break allowed a teacher on the third floor of the freshman building to move students away to safety, he said.

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

"If he had somebody in there with a gun, they could have mitigated this," the sheriff said. "There were opportunities for staff to have intervened if they had been armed."

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

The only armed guard on campus, Deputy Scot Peterson of the Broward County Sheriff's Office, remained outside the building during the shooting. He resigned and has since said he was not sure where the gunman was.

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

The comments came after prosecutors Wednesday released hours of video interrogation of Cruz, showing the young man slouching in a chair, being repeatedly urged by a detective to speak louder and punching himself in the face when he is alone.

Gualtieri told the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission earlier this week that Cruz’s fluctuating behavior through the years made it difficult for school officials to determine how he should be handled.

“It was really a roller-coaster with Cruz really from birth,” Gualtieri said. A report released last week by the Broward County school district said he began showing behavioral issues that got him kicked out of pre-kindergarten. He spent his school years shuttling between regular campuses and those for children with emotional and behavioral problems.

“He had some really bad low times but at times he was without behavioral issues,” Gualtieri said.

While the official commission report has not been concluded, it’s pretty obvious just how badly this entire situation was handled from start to finish. The shooter was essentially abandoned by the school district, which had all the red flags it needed to stop him before this got started. When the shooting happened, the Coward of Broward, Scot Peterson, who was the only person in a position to stop the shooter in the moment, failed. Because he failed to act, more people died. The entire Broward County Sheriff’s Department bungled the response at the scene. And then in the aftermath, CNN rushed to prop up the student activists and the sheriff to blame the NRA for what happened at Stoneman Douglas High School. And ever since, the activist kids have been treated with kid gloves (while continually beclowning themselves), while those who lost their children and siblings are demanding that change begin at home.

A group of families of the Parkland shooting victims is holding a news conference to decry the leadership of the Broward County Public Schools when it comes to making schools safer. “There has been no sense of urgency,” said Tony Montalto, whose daughter, Gina, was killed.

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

They’re calling on changes to the school board. Several board members are on the Aug. 28 ballot. Two Parkland parents are running. Some of them also say they have lost confidence in the district superintendent.

— Patricia Mazzei (@PatriciaMazzei) August 9, 2018

The parents and spouses of the Florida high school massacre’s victims called Thursday for the ouster of their county’s school board, saying the members haven’t done enough to bolster security before students return to class next week.

Tony Montalto, president of Stand With Parkland, the group the families formed after the Feb. 14 attack, pointed at a press conference to the Broward County school district’s decision to abort an internal investigation into the Feb. 14 shooting and to delay installing metal detectors at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where his 14-year-old daughter Gina, 13 other students and three staff members died.

“The constant reversals of policy decisions continue to leave our county’s students and teachers at risk and clearly show that there is no unified plan to keep them safe,” Montalto said. “The modern plague of mass shootings in America’s schools forced school districts, administrators and law enforcement across the country to carefully study the lessons of tragedies like Columbine and Sandy Hook. Many acted quickly to protect students and teachers … In Broward County there has been no sense of urgency.”

Two parents of victims are running for the board in the Aug. 28 election where five of the nine seats will be decided.

The district said in a statement Thursday saying it’s “understandable that the Marjory Stoneman Douglas families feel frustrated,” but the district has made progress. Superintendent Robert Runcie has said police officers or armed guards will be at all 234 district schools starting Wednesday.

But those explanations have done little to mollify the victims’ family members, who crowded around a podium Thursday during a break in a meeting of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Public Safety Commission. Those who spoke tore into the board and some tore into Runcie.

“The leadership in place is not the right leadership for the times — they are failing,” said Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter Jaime was killed.

April Schentrup, who was an elementary school principal in the district when her 16-year-old daughter Carmen died at Stoneman Douglas, said “leadership matters.”

“When we have leaders who wait to have others do their job for them, ask others to do their investigation, ask others to take roles that they should take on their own — that is not the leadership we need,” said Schentrup, whom Runcie appointed to be the district’s director of safety and security in June.

Families of slain #MSD students stand together saying @browardschools School Board and @RobertwRuncie has failed to make schools safe ahead of next school year, which starts next week @nbc6 #Parkland pic.twitter.com/Axk0YnKJZg

— Marissa Bagg (@MarissaNBC6) August 9, 2018

Where is the national media, showing these parents who are demanding safety for the children of the Broward County School District? They’ve moved on to their next shiny object. And the activist kids? They’re too busy being famous.

David Hogg, Parkland students featured in new Michael Moore documentary 'Fahrenheit 11/9' https://t.co/gQmCFxtZ95 pic.twitter.com/hBxCaw7kzl

— South Florida Sun Sentinel (@SunSentinel) August 10, 2018

Those who lost their loved ones are the ones to pay attention to, because they are trying to change a deeply dysfunctional system to keep anyone else from going through what they have. And I hope that every police officer, or armed guard, who stands duty on a school campus during this upcoming school year, has the moral fortitude to stand strong in the face of danger and protect those students. We’ve seen the consequences of what happens when those who are supposed to be on guard fail in their duty.