Nikolas Cruz: End of trial's penalty phase for convicted Parkland shooter nears
FORT LAUDERDALE - After months of testimony, the penalty phase for convicted Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz is nearing an end.
Attorneys for both sides appeared in court to discuss a variety of motions as the judge met with prosecutors and defense attorneys to hammer out the wording on the jury instruction sheet that jurors will get.
Closing arguments are scheduled for Tuesday with deliberations expected to begin Wednesday.
Jurors were told to bring their suitcases since they'll be sequestered unless they reach a decision on the first day. They will stay at an undisclosed hotel.
The jury will decide whether to impose 17 separate life or death sentences for the massacre that happened at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland on Valentine's Day in 2018.
The shooter pleaded guilty to 17 counts of murder and 17 counts of attempted murder a year ago.
They have no time limit for deliberations to decide whether to recommend Cruz be put to death or sentenced to life in prison. To recommend the death penalty, jurors have to be unanimous on all 17 counts.
Although the trial is to decide Cruz's punishment and nothing else, relatives of the victims said they are glad the court hearing is reaching its conclusion.
"My frame of mind is I'm glad we are near an end," said Debbi Hixon, whose husband, athletic director Chris Hixon, was killed during the mass shooting.
Hixon told CBS 4 Monday that regardless of the court outcome, it will change nothing about her reality, which is life without her husband.
"Having a death sentence will bring some justice and send a message this is intolerable," she said.
Prosecutors have tried to prove that the shooting was a cold and carefully planned massacre by someone suffering from an anti-social personality disorder.
But the defense attorneys contend that alcoholism that Cruz's birth mother's battle led to the violence.
"His brain was broken," defense attorney Melisa McNeill said in her opening statement.
"It all comes down to the jury and that whole selection process," said longtime Broward County defense attorney Jim Lewis, adding that the jury will take their time weighing the information they heard during the proceedings. "I have to think the thought of taking someone his age, strapping them into a gurney and filling them with poison will have an impact."
Devastating statements from Cruz
It's possible Cruz talked himself into a death sentence.
Prosecutors played videos last week of jailhouse interviews he did this year with two of their mental health experts. In frank and sometimes graphic detail, he answered their questions about his massacre of 17 people at Parkland's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14, 2018, along with his planning, his motivation, and the shootings.
While it can't be known what the 12 jurors are thinking, if any are wavering between voting for death or life without parole, his statements to Dr. Charles Scott, a forensic psychiatrist, and Robert Denney, a neuropsychologist, did not help his cause.
"All of this made Cruz himself perhaps one of the state's best witnesses," said David S. Weinstein, a Miami defense attorney and former prosecutor who has been monitoring the trial.
Because Cruz's defense is that his birth mother's heavy drinking during pregnancy left him brain damaged, prosecutors could have experts examine him for their rebuttal case.
Scott and Denney interviewed him separately for several hours. In each, Cruz sat across the table, handcuffed, a sweater draped over his chest. He sometimes asked for a pen and paper to add diagrams and drawings to his explanations.
"The question is: What will the jury take away from the interviews? A cold-blooded killer who was vengeful and excited about the murders, or a person so hopelessly deranged that he can't be anything but crazy?" said Bob Jarvis, a professor at Nova Southeastern University's law school.
Excerpts from those interviews, some of which are graphic:
HOW LONG HAD CRUZ BEEN CONTEMPLATING A SCHOOL SHOOTING?
"A very long time," Cruz told Scott, starting when he was 13 or 14, about five years before he did it.
"It was just a thought. I was reading books," Cruz said. "It would come and go. It would pop up in my mind."
The thoughts would return when he watched violent videos, particularly documentaries about mass shootings at Colorado's Columbine High School, Virginia Tech, and elsewhere, he said.
HOW DID CRUZ PLAN THE MASSACRE?
"I did my own research," Cruz told Scott. "I studied mass murderers and how they did it, their plans, what they got and what they used."
He detailed the lessons he learned: Watch for would-be rescuers coming around corners, keep some distance from your targeted victims, attack as fast as possible - and "the police didn't do anything."
"I have a small opportunity to shoot people for maybe 20 minutes," Cruz said.
HOW DID CRUZ PREPARE?
He told Scott he put his AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle in a bag the night before and slipped its magazines into a shooting vest. He adjusted the gun's sights and imagined what the recoil would feel like.
"I didn't get any sleep," Cruz said.
He donned the burgundy polo shirt he received when he was a member of the Stoneman Douglas Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps program so he could escape by mingling with fleeing students.
"If I had all my (shooting) gear on, they would have called the cops," Cruz said.
When he set out at 2 p.m., he told the Uber driver he was in the school orchestra and the bag carried his instrument.
WHAT DID CRUZ DO WHEN HE ARRIVED?
"I walked through the gates. Hopefully, there would be no security guards, but I was wrong," Cruz told Scott. "I was looking at the guy and he was watching me."
When Cruz attended Stoneman Douglas, guards frequently checked him for weapons because of his erratic and sometimes violent behavior. When he was expelled a year before the shooting, a guard predicted he would eventually return and shoot people.
Fearing he'd been discovered, Cruz sprinted into a three-story classroom building and quickly assembled his weapon. He told a student who happened upon him to flee because something bad was about to happen.
He then went floor to floor, shooting down hallways and into classrooms, firing 140 shots in all.
"I thought they would scream," Cruz said about his first three victims. He shot them point-blank outside a locked classroom door. "It was more like they passed out and blood came pouring out of their head. It was really nasty and sad to see."
But he continued.
"I think I showed mercy to three girls. I was going to walk away, but they showed nasty faces and I went back," Cruz said. "I thought they were going to attack me."
Cruz shot several of his victims a second time after they fell, including his final one - a student writhing from a leg wound. He said the boy "gave me a nasty look. A look of anger."
"His head blew up like a water balloon," Cruz said.
WHY DID CRUZ STOP SHOOTING?
Students and teachers fled the building or locked themselves in classrooms. The third-floor hallway was now empty except for victims.
"I couldn't find anyone to kill," he said. "I didn't want to do it anymore and I didn't think there was anyone else in the building."
He dropped his gun and vest on the stairwell and fled. He was captured an hour later - the police officer had been looking for a young male in a Stoneman Douglas ROTC polo.
CRUZ'S FINAL SAY
As Denney was finishing the final interview, he asked Cruz if there was anything else he should know. Cruz thought for 10 seconds before responding: "Why I chose Valentine's Day."
"Because I thought no one would love me," Cruz explained. "I didn't like Valentine's Day and I wanted to ruin it for everyone."
"Do you mean for the family members of the kids that were killed?" Denney asked.
"No, for the school," Cruz replied.
The holiday will never be celebrated there again, he said.