Nikolas Cruz | |
---|---|
Born | Margate, Florida, U.S. | September 24, 1998
Education | Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School (expelled) |
Occupation | Former Dollar Tree cashier |
Known for | Perpetrator of the Parkland high school shooting |
Criminal status | Incarcerated |
Motive | Disputed:
|
Conviction(s) | 17 counts of premeditated first-degree murder, 17 counts of attempted first-degree murder |
Criminal penalty | 34 consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole |
Details | |
Date | February 14, 2018 |
Target(s) | Students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School |
Killed | 17 |
Injured | 17 |
Weapons | Smith & Wesson M&P15 Sport II semi-automatic rifle |
Nikolas Jacob Cruz (born September 24, 1998) [3] [4] [5] is an American mass murderer who perpetrated the Parkland high school shooting, where he shot and killed 17 people while wounding 17 others on February 14, 2018. In 2022, Cruz was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for the shooting, which remains the deadliest high school shooting in the United States.
Cruz had been known for behavioral problems since preschool, [6] and as a teenager on social media he shared his obsessions with mass shootings and expressed racist, antisemitic, homophobic, and xenophobic views. [7] He was a member of the Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps. [8] He legally purchased various firearms prior to the shooting. [9]
Cruz was born on September 24, 1998, to Brenda Norma Woodard (June 25, 1956 – August 23, 2021). [10] [11] His biological father’s identity is unknown. He was put in an orphanage after his birth, and was adopted by Roger and Lynda Cruz. Both his adoptive parents died, Roger at age 67 on August 11, 2004, and Lynda at age 68 on November 1, 2017, leaving Cruz orphaned three months before the shooting. [12] Since his mother's death, he had been living with relatives and friends. [13] Cruz was a member of the Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps and had received multiple awards including academic achievement for "maintaining an A grade in JROTC and Bs in other subjects", according to CNN. [8] He was also a member of his school's varsity air rifle team. [8] [14] At the time of the shooting, he was enrolled in a GED program and employed at a local Dollar Tree. [15] [16]
Cruz had behavioral issues since preschool, [6] and was eligible for special education services alongside an IEP. According to The Washington Post Cruz was "well-known to school and mental health authorities and was entrenched in the process for getting students help rather than referring them to law enforcement". [17] Stephen E. Moskowitz diagnosed Cruz with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and oppositional defiant disorder (ODD). He was transferred between schools six times in three years in an effort to deal with these problems. In 2014, he was transferred to a school for children with emotional or learning disabilities. There were reports that he made threats against other students. [18]
Cruz returned to Stoneman Douglas High School two years later but was expelled in 2017 for disciplinary reasons. As he could not be expelled from the Broward County School system completely, he was transferred to alternative placement. [19] The school administration had circulated an email to teachers, warning that Cruz had made threats against other students. The school banned him from wearing a backpack on campus. [20] [21] [22]
Psychiatrists recommended an involuntary admission of Cruz to a residential treatment facility, starting in 2013. [23] The Florida Department of Children and Families investigated him in September 2016 for Snapchat posts in which he cut both his arms and said he planned to buy a gun. At this time, a school resource officer suggested [24] he undergo an involuntary psychiatric examination under the provisions of the Baker Act. Two guidance counselors agreed, but a mental institution did not. [25] State investigators reported he had depression, autism, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and had a history of attempting suicide. However Psychologist Frederick M. Kravitz later testified that Cruz was never diagnosed with autism. [26] In their assessment, they concluded he was "at low risk of harming himself or others". [27] He had previously received mental health treatment, but had not received treatment in the year leading up to the shooting. [8]
The school district conducted an assessment of the handling of Cruz. According to their redacted report, which was reviewed in August 2018 by The New York Times , The Daily Beast , and other media, a year before the shooting, Cruz had sought help from education specialists, as his grades at Stoneman Douglas were declining. He was an eighteen-year-old junior, and met with the specialists with his mother. The specialists recommended that he transfer to another school, Cross Creek School in Pompano Beach, where he had done well before, but he wanted to graduate with his class at Stoneman Douglas, and rejected this option, as a legal adult. He was advised that if he stayed, he would no longer be able to access special education services, but this was incorrect. [28] [29] A few months later, he withdrew because of failing grades. After that, Cruz requested to go to Cross Creek, but he was told a new assessment was needed, delaying action, and the request was denied. [30] [31] [32]
Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel described Cruz's online profiles and accounts as "very, very disturbing". [8] They contained pictures and posts of him with a variety of weapons, including long knives, a shotgun, a pistol, and a BB gun. Police said that he held "extremist" views; social media accounts that were thought to be linked to him contained anti-black and anti-Muslim slurs. [8] YouTube comments linked to him include "I wanna die Fighting killing shit ton of people", and threats against police officers. [8] Cruz also idolized many different infamous mass murderers, such as Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, Seung-Hui Cho, James Eagan Holmes, and Elliot Rodger, as well as regularly read and studied Wikipedia articles and documentaries about infamous mass shootings. [8] [33] [34] [35]
In February 2017, Cruz legally purchased an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle from a Coral Springs gun store, after having passed the required background check. Prior to the purchase, he had similarly obtained several other firearms, including at least one shotgun and several other rifles. [9] At the time of the shooting, in Florida, it was legal for people as young as 18 to purchase guns from federally licensed dealers, including the rifle allegedly used in the shooting. The minimum age requirement has since been raised to 21. [36] [37] [38]
Items recovered by police at the scene included gun magazines with swastikas carved in them. One student claimed that Cruz had drawn a swastika and the words "I hate niggers" on his backpack. [39] CNN reported that Cruz was in a private Instagram group chat where he expressed racist, antisemitic, xenophobic, and homophobic views. Cruz said that he hated "jews, niggers, immigrants" and frequently discussed the weapons that he owned. At one point, Cruz said "I think I am going to kill people" in the group chat, although he later claimed that he was joking. [7]
A former classmate said Cruz had anger management issues and often joked about guns and gun violence, which included threats of shooting up establishments. [40] The brother of a 2016 graduate described him as "super stressed out all the time and talked about guns a lot and tried to hide his face". A student who was enrolled at the school at the time of the shooting said, "I think everyone had in their minds if anybody was going to do it, it was going to be him." [41] A classmate who was assigned to work with him in sophomore year said, "He told me how he got kicked out of two private schools. He was held back twice. He had aspirations to join the military. He enjoyed hunting." [8] A student's mother said that he also bragged about killing animals. A neighbor said his mother would call the police over to the house to try to talk some sense into him. [42]
Sheriff Scott Israel said that his office received 23 calls about Cruz during the previous decade. CNN used a public records request to obtain a sheriff's office log, which showed that from 2008 to 2017, at least 45 calls were made in reference to Cruz, his brother, or the family home combined. [43] [44] On February 5, 2016, the calls included an anonymous tip that Cruz had threatened to shoot up the school, and a tip on November 30, 2017, that he might be a "school shooter in the making" and that he collected knives and guns. On September 23, 2016, a peer counselor notified the school resource officer of his suicide attempt and intent to buy a gun, and the school indicated it would do a "threat assessment". [45] [46] [47]
In September 2016, three people—a sheriff's deputy who worked as a resource officer at Stoneman Douglas, and two of the school's counselors—stated that Cruz should be committed for mental evaluation. [48] [49]
On September 24, 2017, a person with the username "nikolas cruz" posted a comment to a YouTube video that read, "Im [ sic ] going to be a professional school shooter." The person who uploaded the video to YouTube reported the comment to the FBI. According to agent Robert Lasky, the agency conducted database reviews but was unable to track down the individual who made the threatening comment. [50] [51]
On January 5, 2018, less than two months before the shooting, the FBI received a tip on its Public Access Line from a person who was close to Cruz. On February 16, two days after the shooting, the agency released a statement that detailed this information. According to the statement, "The caller provided information about Cruz's gun ownership, desire to kill people, erratic behavior, and disturbing social media posts, as well as the potential of him conducting a school shooting." After conducting an investigation, the FBI said the tip line did not follow protocol when the information was not forwarded to the Miami Field Office, where investigative steps would have been taken. [52] [53] The FBI opened a probe into the tip line's operations. [54]
The response by Israel and other members of the Broward County Sheriff's Office to the numerous red flags and warnings about Cruz has been the subject of scrutiny. [55] In the days following the shooting, calls for Israel’s resignation intensified as more information that alluded to the department's inaction was revealed. [56] Israel refused to resign in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, saying during an interview with CNN, "I've given amazing leadership to this agency" while denying responsibility for the actions of his deputies. [57] [58] [59] [60] This culminated in Governor Ron DeSantis removing Israel from his role as Sheriff and replacing him with Gregory Tony. [61]
On February 14, 2018, Cruz opened fire on students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, murdering 17 people [note 1] and injuring 17 others. [62] [63] [64] Cruz, a former student at the school, fled the scene on foot by blending in with other students and was arrested without incident approximately one hour and twenty minutes later in nearby Coral Springs. [65]
Cruz told a psychologist that he committed the shooting on Valentine's Day because he believed that no one loved him. [66]
At his initial arraignment the day after the shootings, Cruz was charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder and held without bond. [67] [68] According to an affidavit by the sheriff's office, Cruz confessed to the shooting. It was also claimed Cruz told officers that he brought additional loaded magazines hidden in a backpack. [69] [70]
Cruz was placed on suicide watch in an isolation cell (solitary confinement) after the arraignment. [71] Lead defense counsel Gordon Weekes asked Broward Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer to recuse herself, claiming that her previous comments and rulings showed favoritism toward the prosecution, which would prevent Cruz from receiving a fair trial. She disagreed and declined the request on February 26. [72]
On March 7, 2018, a grand jury indicted Cruz on a total of 34 charges: 17 counts of first-degree murder and 17 counts of attempted first-degree murder. [73] He was arraigned on March 13, and the prosecution filed notice of their intent to seek the death penalty. [74] They said they could prove five of the aggravating factors that qualify a murder for the death penalty in Florida. Cruz declined to enter a plea, so Scherer entered "not guilty" on his behalf. The defense had earlier offered a guilty plea if the death penalty were taken off the table, and reiterated it immediately before it was refused. [75]
During the week of April 8–12, 2018, Scherer included a three-page letter from a Minnesotan into the court record of the case. The letter was addressed to the judge and claimed that research into Cruz's past led the writer to believe that Cruz had a developmental disability and that he was "fearful of other people and was threatened by bullies." The letter ended by claiming that Cruz appeared to be consumed by sadness and depression. [76]
The same week, a hearing was held to determine if Cruz was entitled to a public defender. His attorney, court-appointed public defender Howard Finkelstein, asked the court to wait until the probate case involving Cruz's late mother's estate was concluded and Cruz's net worth could be determined, as Cruz would have only been entitled to a public defender had he been unable to afford a private attorney. [77]
According to the Broward County Sheriff's Office, Cruz attacked a jail officer on the night of November 13, 2018. [78] The following day, he was charged with aggravated assault on an officer, battery against an officer, and use of an "electric or chemical weapon against an officer". The officer who was allegedly attacked by Cruz had asked him to "not drag his sandals on the ground" while he was walking in the jail's dayroom. It was claimed Cruz responded by "displaying his middle finger" and striking the officer in the face. He also grabbed the stun gun out of the deputy's holster. The weapon discharged during the brawl before the deputy regained control and Cruz was placed in solitary confinement. Cruz appeared at an initial hearing on the assault charges, where bail was set at $200,000. [79]
On April 24, 2019, a determination was made that Cruz and his half-brother Zachary would share the proceeds of a MetLife insurance policy valued at $864,929. [80] This would make Cruz ineligible for representation by the public defender's office, and the office therefore asked to be removed from his case on that date.
Scherer ruled on July 26 that Cruz's confession would be released to the public, adding on August 3 that the Broward school district's report on Cruz would also be released, with some redactions to protect Cruz's privacy rights. [81] The confession was released on August 6. [82] On August 8, a video of Cruz's confession filmed by the Broward County Sheriff's Office was published by TMZ. Cruz can be heard crying near the end of the video, and saying "kill me" to the camera. [83]
Cruz's trial, initially scheduled to begin on January 27, 2020, was originally delayed until mid-year to allow his lawyers more time to build their case. [84] The case was then delayed again due to the COVID-19 pandemic; [85] the case was expected to go to trial in September 2021. [86] However, a start date for the trial was not set. [87]
Prior to trial, the judge, Elizabeth Scherer, ruled that the use of "derogatory words" to refer to Cruz would not be allowed from prosecutors or witnesses during the trial, saying that it would not be feasible to create an "exhaustive list of words" that should not be used to describe Cruz. However, Judge Scherer also ruled against the defense in the use of some words, ruling that Cruz can be called "killer", "school shooter" or "murderer" as she deemed those words "normal to describe particular facts." [88]
On October 14, a trial was scheduled for the following day, where it was reported that Cruz would plead guilty to the battery charge. [89] Judge Scherer stated she would hold a hearing on October 20, where Cruz planned to plead guilty to all counts relating to the shooting to avoid the death penalty. [90]
On October 20, Cruz pled guilty to all charges, including murder and attempted murder. Cruz made a statement after pleading guilty in which he expressed remorse for his crimes and asked the victims' families to decide his fate.
Cruz was also sentenced that day for his attack on Sgt. Beltran. He was given 26 years in prison for the assault charge. [91]
Cruz's death penalty trial began July 18, 2022, and was presided over by Judge Scherer. [92] On July 27, 2022, prosecutors presented the jurors digital evidence in their investigation. Jurors were presented with an 18-page list of search queries from various Google accounts. The list included searches such as "how to become a school shooter", and "pumped up kicks columbine high school" (a reference to the song "Pumped Up Kicks"). [93] [94] On August 4, 2022, the prosecution rested its case. [95] On August 20, 2022, the Sun Sentinel released drawings written by Cruz in prison, which he had created in May. In the drawings, he blamed his ex-girlfriend's new boyfriend for making him do the shooting, who Cruz claimed sexually humiliated him on Instagram prior to the attack. [96] Anthony Montalto III, the brother of victim Gina Montalto, called Cruz a "murdering bastard"; [97] while Michael Schulman, the father of victim Scott Biegel, said that his wish for his 70th birthday was to hear word that Cruz had been killed in prison. [98]
The defense presented the jurors evidence and testimony that Cruz suffered from brain damage and disabilities resulting from his birth mother smoking, drinking alcohol and using various illegal drugs during her pregnancy with him and failure by the state and the school and other sources to get him proper treatment. [99] [100] [101] [102] [103] [104] In a rebuttal, an expert witness for the prosecution testified that Cruz faked Fetal Alcohol Syndrome in a psychiatric evaluation and diagnosed him with both antisocial and borderline personality disorder. [105]
The defense team for Cruz rested their case on September 14, 2022. The prosecution's rebuttal began on September 27, 2022, and ended on September 29, 2022. Cruz's Google and YouTube search history were presented to the court, showing searches of child pornography, rape, racism, Nazism and killing animals. [106] Closing arguments were delivered on October 11, 2022. [107]
On October 13, 2022, the jury recommended that Cruz be sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. While the jury found that the state had proven beyond a reasonable doubt the aggravating factors on all counts, they were not unanimous on whether the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors. [108] [note 2]
Nearly all of the murdered victims' families expressed anger and extreme disappointment toward the verdict, stating in their victim impact statements that he deserved the death penalty. [109] Other points of contention from the victims were the perceived improper conduct of Cruz's lawyers during the trial as well as the unanimity required by Florida law to impose the death penalty as opposed to a majority vote. [110] Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who also criticized the jury's recommendation, called for changes to the law. [111] In April 2023, DeSantis signed a bill allowing juries to recommend the death penalty in capital cases on an 8–4 vote, among other measures. [112]
On November 2, 2022, Cruz was sentenced to 34 consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole, one each for the total number of victims murdered and wounded by Cruz. [113]
In June 2024, Cruz settled a civil lawsuit with shooting victim Anthony Borges granting him rights to Cruz's name so that Cruz cannot grant interviews or make any agreement with film producers or authors without Borges’ permission. Borges’ lawyer said the objective was to take power and control from Cruz so he "cannot inflict further torture on his victims from jail." Cruz also agreed to donate his brain to science. [114]
Parkland is a city in northern Broward County, Florida, United States. It is a suburb of Miami and located 42 miles (68 km) north of the city. As of the 2020 census, the population of Parkland was 34,670. Parkland is part of the Miami metropolitan area, which was home to 6,166,488 people in 2020.
Broward County Public Schools is a public school district serving Broward County, Florida, and is the sixth largest public school system in the nation. During the 2023–2024 school year, Broward County Public Schools served 251,106 students enrolled in 326 schools and education centers district-wide. The district is headquartered in downtown Fort Lauderdale. It is the sole school district in the county.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School is a public high school in Parkland, Florida, United States. Established in 1990 as part of the Broward County Public Schools district and named after the writer Marjory Stoneman Douglas, it is the only public high school in Parkland, serving almost the entire city as well as a small section of neighboring Coral Springs.
The Broward County Sheriff's Office (BSO) is a public safety organization With 5,400 employees, it is the largest sheriff's office in the state of Florida. Sheriff Gregory Tony heads the agency.
Michael J Satz is an American attorney and politician in the State of Florida, who served as State Attorney for Florida's 17th judicial circuit, covering Broward County from 1976 to 2021.
The Parkland high school shooting was a mass shooting that occurred on February 14, 2018, when 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz opened fire on students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in the Miami metropolitan area city of Parkland, Florida, killing 17 people and injuring 17 others. Cruz, a former student at the school, fled the scene on foot by blending in with other students and was arrested without incident approximately one hour and twenty minutes later in nearby Coral Springs. Police and prosecutors investigated "a pattern of disciplinary issues and unnerving behavior".
Scott Israel is an American law enforcement officer in Florida, and the former Broward County Sheriff.
X González is an American activist and advocate for gun control. In 2018, they survived the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, and, in response, co-founded the gun-control advocacy group Never Again MSD.
Never Again MSD is an American student-led political action committee for gun control that advocates for tighter regulations to prevent gun violence. The organization, also known by the Twitter hashtags #NeverAgain, and #EnoughIsEnough, was formed by a group of twenty students attending Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School (MSD) in Parkland, Florida at the time of the deadly shooting in 2018, in which seventeen students and staff members were killed by the gunman, Nikolas Cruz, who was a 19-year-old former student of the school and was armed with an AR-15 style semi-automatic rifle. The organization started on social media as a movement "for survivors of the Stoneman Douglas Shooting, by survivors of the Stoneman Douglas Shooting" using the hashtag #NeverAgain. A main goal of the group was to influence that year's United States mid-term elections, and they embarked on a multi-city bus tour to encourage young people to register to vote.
Cameron Marley Kasky is an American activist and advocate against gun violence who co-founded the student-led gun violence prevention advocacy group Never Again MSD. He is notable for helping to organize the March for Our Lives nationwide student protest in March 2018. Kasky is a survivor of the February 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Kasky was included in Time magazine's "100 Most Influential People of 2018".
David Miles Hogg is an American gun control activist. He rose to prominence during the 2018 United States gun violence protests as a student survivor of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, helping lead several high-profile protests, marches, and boycotts, including the boycott of The Ingraham Angle. He has also been a target and scapegoat of several conspiracy theories.
Scot Peterson is an American former sheriff's deputy who was involved in the events of the 2018 high school shooting incident at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in the Broward suburban town of Parkland, Florida. At the time of the shooting, he was a Broward County Sheriff's Office deputy sheriff.
Fred Guttenberg is an American activist against gun violence. His 14-year-old daughter Jaime Guttenberg was murdered in the Parkland high school shooting in suburban Fort Lauderdale, Florida on February 14, 2018. His son, Jesse, also a student at the school, ran from the shooting to meet him at a nearby store. He learned about his daughter's death from a friend who is a Coral Springs SWAT officer. Jessica McBride, for the website Heavy, described him as "one of the strongest voices for changes to gun laws in the wake of the mass shooting".
Kyle Kashuv is an American conservative activist. He survived the 2018 Stoneman Douglas High School shooting and subsequently advocated for gun rights, notably in opposition to his fellow survivors' March for Our Lives movement.
Andrew Scott Pollack is an American author, school safety activist, and entrepreneur whose daughter Meadow was one of the 17 murdered victims in the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018.
Ryan Blaine Petty is an American school safety activist. His 14-year-old daughter Alaina Petty was murdered in the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting on February 14, 2018. Petty is credited with helping to pass the "Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act" Florida Senate Bill 7026 just three weeks after his daughter Alaina was murdered. At the federal level, Petty worked with Senators Orrin Hatch, Marco Rubio and Bill Nelson to pass the STOP School Violence Act and the Fix NICS Act of 2017. He has met frequently with former Florida governor Rick Scott, and many federal lawmakers.
Hunter Pollack is an American lawyer, political advisor, and school safety activist, whose younger sister, Meadow, passed in the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018. He is the son of Shara Kaplan and Andrew Pollack. Hunter is Jewish.
Samantha Deitsch is an American author and gun control activist who survived the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018.
Aalayah Eastmond is an American activist and advocate for gun violence prevention, social justice, and racial equality. After surviving the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, Eastmond began her activism during the 2018 United States gun violence protests. She has testified multiple times to the U.S. Congress. Eastmond is an executive council member of Team Enough, a youth-led gun violence prevention organization which is part of the Brady Campaign. Eastmond co-founded Concerned Citizens of DC in the wake of the murder of George Floyd to organize protests supporting social justice issues in Washington, D.C. She supports Black Lives Matter and protests against police brutality.
Elizabeth Anne Scherer is an American lawyer who served as a judge in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida from 2012 until her resignation in 2023.
Contrary to early reports, Cruz was never expelled from Broward schools. Legally, he couldn't be. Under federal law, Nikolas Cruz had a right to a 'free and appropriate' education at a public school near him.
interviews with teachers, administrators and those who knew Cruz – along with other records and accounts – show that he was well-known to school and mental health authorities and was entrenched in the process for getting students help rather than referring them to law enforcement.
Contrary to early reports, Cruz was never expelled from Broward schools. Legally, he couldn't be. Under federal law, Nikolas Cruz had a right to a 'free and appropriate' education at a public school near him.
He had even suggested that counselors use Florida's Baker Act to have Cruz involuntarily committed, but a health expert wrote that Cruz "did not meet criteria for further assessment."
[a] school resource officer [...] wanted to use the Baker Act on September 28, 2016, after the then-student allegedly made threats against himself and others. Although two guidance counselors initially agreed with [the officer], two mental health professionals from Henderson Behavioral Health said Cruz didn't meet the criteria
I looked up on Wikipedia [sic], I studied mass murderers and how they did it.
Cruz purchased the Smith & Wesson M&P 15 rifle in February 2017 from Sunrise Tactical Supply in Coral Springs, officials said. Cruz passed a background check, which looks at criminal history and whether someone has been found to be "mentally defective" by a court, said Peter Forcelli, the special agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in South Florida...As is the case in most states, Floridians can buy assault-style weapons from federally licensed dealers once they reach age 18.
deputies were under review for how they handled two calls, including the one from November where the caller also said Cruz "was collecting guns and knives," according to documents released by the sheriff's office. A deputy followed up with the caller but did not create a report documenting it. A separate incident, from February 2016, was also under review. The sheriff's office said a deputy responded to a tip that Cruz planned to shoot up a school and that the information was forwarded to Peterson, the school resource officer.
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