"I studied mass murderers and how they did it, their plans, what they got and what they used." "I did my own research," Cruz told Scott. 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. "A very long time," Cruz told Scott, starting when he was 13 or 14, about five years before he did it. HOW LONG HAD CRUZ BEEN CONTEMPLATING A SCHOOL SHOOTING? "The question is: What will the jury take away from the interviews? 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.Įxcerpts from those interviews, some of which are graphic: He sometimes asked for a pen and paper to add diagrams and drawings to his explanations. In each, Cruz sat across the table, handcuffed, a sweater draped over his chest. Scott and Denney interviewed him separately for several hours. Closing arguments are scheduled Tuesday, with deliberations beginning Wednesday.īecause 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. But if all 17 counts come back with at least one vote in favor of life in prison, then that would be his sentence. For the 24-year-old to get a death sentence, the jury must be unanimous on at least one victim. The jury will likely decide Cruz's fate this week. Weinstein, a Miami defense attorney and former prosecutor who has been monitoring the trial. "All of this made Cruz himself perhaps one of the state's best witnesses," said David S. Charles Scott, a forensic psychiatrist, and Robert Denney, a neuropsychologist, did not help his cause. 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. 14, 2018 - his planning, his motivation, the shootings. 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. Prosecutors played video last week at Cruz's penalty trial of jailhouse interviews he did this year with two of their mental health experts. FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - It's possible Florida school shooter Nikolas Cruz talked himself into a death sentence.
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