Florida Jury Spares Parkland Shooter from Death Penalty Even Though Prosecution Requested It

The Jury in the Parkland Shooter case has had their verdict read aloud today by Judge Elizabeth Scherer. While he was found guilty of murdering 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas Highschool, the Jury did not choose to recommend the death penalty for Nikolas Cruz.

The prosecution sought the death penalty, however, and in closing arguments an emotional lead prosecutor, Mike Staz read the names of each victim and added, “The appropriate sentence for Nikolas Cruz is the death penalty.”

A forensic psychiatrist Dr. Charles Scott testified that in a jailhouse interview he held with Cruz, the shooter told him he only ended the shooting because “I didn’t have anyone else to kill.”

Scott testified for the state, sharing that Cruz meets the criteria for a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, meaning he showed no regard for right and wrong. There was also evidence showing he knew what he was doing.

Scott told a reporter, “So, it’s not that he didn’t know or understand that. He did. It’s just that [people] with a social personality disorder, they don’t care.”

Jurors were taken to the site of the school shooting in August. Nothing had changed since the shooting more than four years ago, except the bodies of the victims had been removed.

The jurors walked past dried Valentine’s Day rose petals on the floors of the classrooms as well as large pools of dried blood and walls riddled with bullets.

With all of the evidence presented to them as well as the request from the prosecution to recommend the death penalty, the jury couldn’t bring themselves to recommend it.