State and local community leaders are speaking out after a jury sentenced the Parkland school shooter to life in prison without parole Thursday.
More than four years after Nikolas Cruz shot and killed 17 people and injured 17 more at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, a jury rejected a death sentence and he will now be sentenced to life without parole.
Broward Public Defender Gordon Weekes, whose office represented the gunman, said in a news conference that he hopes the community can respect the verdict and begin to heal.
"This day is not a day of celebration, but a day of solemn acknowledgment and a solemn opportunity to reflect on the healing that is necessary for this community,” Weekes said.
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“I want everyone to recognize that this [defense] team appreciates, respects, and understands their loss,” he said of the victims’ families.
“I hope that we, as a community, can respect the verdict that was rendered, respect the process that was had, and understand that those jurors have spoken, and as a community, we can now begin the process of healing,” he said.
Parkland School Tragedy
Broward County's State Attorney Harold F. Pryor told the victims' families in a news conference that their hearts are with them and commended the courage of the shooting's survivors.
“The dreadful, horrific crimes perpetrated by this school mass shooter in Parkland on Valentine’s Day of 2018 have changed our community and will continue to impact all of us forever more. The parents and families of the schoolchildren and the staff members who were massacred lost so much and our hearts are with them. We hope they know that all of us lost 17 wonderful people that day and that our world is a poorer and sadder place without them," Pryor said. "To the survivors, please know that you are not forgotten in this and that we respect and salute your courage in all that you have endured."
"When I was elected and sworn in as Broward State Attorney, I promised that I would uphold the law and I agreed that this community – not one person sitting in an office – should hear all of the facts and all of the evidence and that this community should make the decision about whether this mass killer should get the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole," he continued.
Pryor went on to thank the jurors for their service, law enforcement who responded to MSD and arrested and investigated the killer, prosecutors, staff, witnesses, and the victims and survivors.
"I thank everyone who worked to ensure that the whole truth – the full story – was told about this tragedy with full transparency. To my knowledge, this is the first time that the full story of a community’s loss and all of the relevant facts have been told about a mass shooting of this magnitude," he said. "We have not shied away from telling all of the horror, all of the loss, all of the devastation, all of the pain, all of the facts, all of the truth. We hope that, while there is no such thing as closure, this will bring some measure of finality and justice to this terrible chapter.”
The superintendent of Broward County Public Schools said in a statement that the district is ready to assist those who need support and deployed additional resources and personnel.
“Our District understands that the jury’s recommendation in the sentencing phase of the trial will impact our students, staff, families and the entire community," Vickie L. Cartwright said. "Our thoughts and support are with the families of the victims of the tragedy. We have mental health professionals at each school in the District. Additional personnel are being deployed to schools throughout our District and stand ready to assist those in need.”
Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony expressed that he disagreed with the verdict and that the justice system "failed" the victims and their families.
"I was hopefully optimistic that today’s verdict would provide equitable justice and a degree of closure for the victims' family members," Tony said in a statement released by his office. "The evidence provided in this case was overwhelming, and the nature of the defendant’s atrocities demonstrated a deliberate and calculated act of unprecedented violence on helpless unarmed children and adults.
"Despite the fact that the defendant slaughtered 17 innocent people without any remorse, the jury chose to spare his life. I disagree with their verdict," he said. "In my opinion, every aspect of our criminal justice system collectively failed the victims and their families. Today, the victims’ families were re-victimized."
Stand With Parkland, which was founded and led by parents of the victims, called the verdict a "gut punch."
“Today’s ruling was yet another gut punch for so many of us who devastatingly lost our loved ones on that tragic Valentine’s Day at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School,” said Tony Montalto, father of Gina Montalto and President of Stand with Parkland. “17 beautiful lives were cut short, by murder, and the monster that killed them gets to live to see another day. While this sentence fails to punish the perpetrator to the fullest extent of the law — it will not stop our mission to effect positive change at a federal, state and local level to prevent school shooting tragedies from shattering other American families.”
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said from a news conference at an elementary school in Lee County that he was disappointed in the verdict.
"I think that if you have a death penalty at all, that that is a case where you're massacring those students with premeditation and utter disregard for basic humanity, that you deserve the death penalty," DeSantis said.
"So the jurors came back, apparently it was 11 to 1 with one holdout refusing to authorize the ultimate punishment," he said. "And that means that this killer is going to end up getting the same sentence as people who committed bad acts but acts that did not ride to this level. I just don't think anything else is appropriate except the capital sentence in this case."
"So I was very disappointed to see that. I'm also disappointed that we're four-and-a-half years after these killings and were just now getting this," he said. "You know they used to do this, he would have been executed in six months. He's guilty, everybody knew that from the beginning. And yet it takes years and years in this legal system, that is not serving the interest of victims. So I was very disappointed to see that."
DeSantis added he "would have done everything in [his] power to expedite that process forward."
Charlie Crist, who is running against DeSantis in the November election, also said the killer deserved the death penalty.
“There are crimes for which the only just penalty is death. The Parkland families and community deserved that degree of justice," he said. “I will continue to pray for healing for the families and every person impacted by this tragedy.”
Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski said that while Cruz's actions we heinous, he called the verdict "severe and just."
“A sentence of life in prison without possibility of parole is a severe and just punishment that also will allow Nikolas Cruz to continue to reflect on the grave harm he caused," he said. "While not excusing his actions, it is clear that multiple and systemic breakdowns within family services, police, and the public school system failed him and the rest of us as well. Seemingly nobody recognized the inadequacies in Mr. Cruz’s life or the state of his mental health. His numerous threats of violence that preceded the mass murder were addressed inadequately, if at all."
"Willful murder is a heinous crime; it cries to God for justice. Yet, while God certainly punished Cain, history’s first murderer, God did not require Cain’s life for having spilt Abel’s blood. (cf. Gn 4:15). Human dignity — that of the convicted as well as our own — is best served by not resorting to the extreme and unnecessary punishment of capital punishment. Modern society has the means to protect itself without the death penalty.
"There is no question that Mr. Cruz’s actions were heinous. The 17 victims who died are forever gone to us; and those who were wounded still struggle to recover fully - both physically and emotionally. Their families and all those who fearfully witnessed this abhorrent act of bloodshed will forever be scarred by it.”
