(Miami) Young American Nikolas Cruz, who killed 17 people in 2018 at a high school in Parkland, Florida, will have his fate decided in the coming days when a jury decides whether he should be sentenced to death or life imprisonment.
Posted yesterday at 11:23 p.m.
His trial is entering the home stretch after about three months of difficult hearings for the families of the victims shot dead at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas school. Nikolas Cruz, 24, pleaded guilty.
The defense and prosecutors will present their final arguments on Tuesday, then the jury will retire to deliberate on Wednesday. If its members – seven men and five women – do not vote unanimously for the death penalty, Nikolas Cruz will be condemned to spend the rest of his days behind bars, without the possibility of parole.
On February 14, 2018, the accused, who was then 19, opened fire with a semi-automatic rifle in the school, from which he had been expelled a year earlier.
In less than ten minutes, he had killed 14 students and three employees and injured 17 other people. He then fled, hiding among the people evacuated from the establishment.
Police arrested him shortly after as he was walking down the street after going to a fast food restaurant.
Cold-blooded killer?
The days to come in court in Fort Lauderdale, north of Miami, will tell who convinced the jury: the prosecution led by prosecutor Michael Satz or the defense brought by Melisa McNeill.
Nikolas Cruz’s lead attorney focused her strategy on her client’s childhood, who she claimed was born with fetal alcohol syndrome to a homeless alcoholic and drug-addicted mother.
“He was poisoned in the womb. Because of this, his brain was damaged beyond repair, through no fault of his own,” she told the court in August.
He then grew up in an abusive home with a depressed and alcoholic adoptive mother. He himself said he was sexually abused by a family friend when he was about nine years old.
For Melisa McNeill, this should lead to lighten her sentence and make her lean towards life imprisonment rather than the death penalty.
In front of her, the prosecution claimed that Nikolas Cruz knew what he was doing when he entered the school with his gun and lots of ammunition.
Prosecutor Michael Satz described the murders as coldly premeditated and recalled that the accused had announced his act in a video recorded a few days before the massacre.
Mr. Satz also had harrowing videos of the killings shown and called several former students who were present during the shooting to testify. He even arranged a crime scene tour with the jury.
He finally tried to discredit the idea that Nikolas Cruz had suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome.
A neuropsychologist called to the bar by the prosecution, Robert Denney, accused the young man of simulating brain problems and of having purposely failed psychomotor tests.
According to this expert, Nikolas Cruz is able to control his actions, as evidenced by the fact that he acted with premeditation, which does not tally with the diagnosis presented by the defence.
Weapons Debate
The Parkland shooting had shocked the country and reignited the gun debate, as Nikolas Cruz had been able to purchase his gun legally despite his liabilities.
On March 24, 2018, a march called by young survivors of the attack and parents of victims brought together 1.5 million people across the country, the largest demonstration ever held in the United States to demand a better regulation of firearms.
But the country continues to be the scene of bloody shootings. Nineteen children and two teachers were killed in May at a school in Uvalde, Texas.
In June, legislation to implement gun control, the largest in nearly 30 years but still well short of President Joe Biden’s ambitions, was passed by Congress.