A cowering Nikolas Cruz was ordered held without bail during his first court appearance on Thursday, where he was officially charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder.
The 19-year-old who killed 17 and injured more than a dozen in a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Wednesday did not speak in court today, other than to confirm his name with a polite ‘yes ma’am’ to the judge. Mostly, he kept his gaze to the ground.
He wore an orange jumpsuit, and had both his hands and ankles shackled. As he took the podium to speak to the judge over livestream video from the county jail, a handful of sheriff’s deputies and prison officials gathered around.
Standing next to him was his female attorney, who comforted him by putting a hand around his shoulder.
Prosecutors asked that Cruz be held without bond, and Cruz’s attorney did not fight them on it. It’s unclear when his next hearing will be, but he has been assigned a judge —Daily Mail
Details are starting to emerge about the shooter, who recently was orphaned, stopped getting mental health treatment about a year ago and even had ties to a white supremacist group.
Students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School painted the picture of a weird and disturbed teen who sold knives out of a lunchbox, bragged about killing animals and was finally kicked out of school for fighting and carrying bullets in his backpack.
An FBI official also said Thursday that they were warned – not once, but twice – about the shooter. One of the warnings came in September, from a bail bondsman in Mississippi who alerted the feds about an alarming online message Cruz wrote saying he was ‘going to be a professional school shooter’
Unbelievable! So many warning signs were ignored.
Ben Bennight says he alerted the FBI to a comment shared by Cruz on one of his YouTube videos back in September. He says the FBI was quick to respond to the concerning statement, arriving at his office the very next day to find out if he knew anything about the young man.
He didn’t hear from the FBI again until after the shooting on Wednesday. At a press conference Thursday morning, an FBI official said they followed up on the report but were ‘unable to further identify the person who made the comment’.
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