A Florida jury has recommended Stoneman Douglas High School shooter Nikolas Cruz be sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Per Associated Press, a 12-person jury reached the verdict following seven hours of deliberations over the course of two days. Judge Elizbaeth Scherer is expected to formally issue a life sentence on Nov. 1, at which point relatives of victims and those he wounded during the shooting will have the opportunity to speak.
The 24-year-old shooter pleaded guilty to the murder of 14 students and three staff members last year. He carried out the shooting in Parkland, Florida on Feb. 14, 2018, during which he also wounded 17 others. Since Florida law dictates a death sentence requires unanimous vote, Cruz will avoid the death penalty. Lead prosecutor Mike Satz said in his closing statements that “the appropriate sentence” for Cruz would have been the death penalty.
Throughout the three-month trial, Satz highlighted that Cruz exhibited eight months of planning prior to the shooting. He fired 140 shots with his AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle, which he legally purchased in February 2017. In videos and posts shared online, Cruz had shared racist, homophobic, antisemitic, and xenophobic views.
“It’s pretty unreal that nobody paid attention to the facts of this case, that nobody can remember who the victim is and what they look like,” said Tony Montalto, the father of shooting victim 14-year-old Gina Montalto, during a press conference on Thursday, per CNN. “I see my beautiful daughter’s face around our home, in my dreams. And I miss her very much.”
Criticizing the verdict, he read a prepared sentence on behalf of the advocacy group Stand With Parkland that described the ruling as “yet another gut punch for so many of us who devastatingly lost our loved ones.” The group plans to continue to push for changes at federal, state, and local levels to prevent further school shootings.
Source: Complex.com